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Division L.6..^Jj 

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Section 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 


THE  STORY  OF  THE 
AMERICAN  BOARD 


AN   ACCOUNT   OF   THE   FIRST   HUNDRED   YEARS   OF 

THE  AMERICAN  BOARD  OF  COMMISSIONERS 

FOR  FOREIGN  MISSIONS 


EDITORIAL    SECRETARY 


HFC    1   li^ 


WILLIAM  E.  STRONG  ^^H<^M^ 


^^.. 


THE    PILGRIM    PRESS 

BOSTON  NEW  YORK  CHICAGO 

AMERICAN  BOARD   OF  COMMISSIONERS  FOR  FOREIGN  MISSIONS 
BOSTON 


Copyright,  1910 


American  Board  of  Commissioners  for 
Foreign  Missions 


Published  September,  1910 


\, 


THE  •  PLIMPTOH  •  PRESS 

[•5V  .D  .O] 
HOaWOOD  •  MASS  •  V  •  3  .  A 


PREFACE 

This  book  does  not  pretend  to  be  a  history  of  the  American 
Board;  that  would  require  more  than  one  volume.  Neither 
is  it  a  history  of  the  Board's  missions;  that  would  necessitate 
even  a  larger  amount  of  detail.  Nor  yet  is  it  a  record  of  the 
2500  missionaries  who  have  been  sent  forth  by  the  Board  since 
its  organization;  that  would  call  for  far  more  of  biography. 
All  that  is  attempted  here  is  to  tell  the  story  of  the  American 
Board:  how  it  came  to  pass;  what  it  set  out  to  do;  and,  in  such' 
degree  as  space  will  allow  and  as  can  be  put  into  words,  what 
it  has  done.  The  aim  has  been  to  portray  the  Board  as  an 
organism  living  and  growing  in  the  world;  to  mark  the  stages 
of  that  growth,  to  reflect  the  temper  and  movement  of  that 
life,  and  to  describe  briefly  and  yet  vividly  some  characteristic 
scenes  enacted  on  the  many  fields  of  the  Board's  enterprise. 

Even  within  these  bounds  it  has  been  a  difficult  task  to 
keep  the  story  down.  Only  the  more  striking  or  instructive 
events  could  be  at  all  dwelt  upon.  The  labor  of  many  stead- 
fast years  and  the  careers  of  noble  and  influential  missionaries 
have  often  been  compressed  into  a  sentence  or  omitted  alto- 
gether as  like  what  had  been  already  related  of  other  lands 
or  of  other  lives.  Having  always  in  mind  the  reader  with  but 
general  and  remote  knowledge  o"  the  mission  field,  it  seemed 
best  to  fix  attention  on  selected  scenes,  typical,  significant, 
or  inspiring;  to  attempt  a  more  comprehensive  and  balanced 
account  might  rather  distract  and  confuse. 

Towers  do  not  make  a  city;  but  they  mark  it.  There  is 
much  between  them,  and  much  that  is  fundamental  to  the 


vi  PREFACE 

city's  life  and  welfare.  Yet  these  towers,  by  their  number, 
location,  character,  and  increase,  do  impress  the  observer  with 
the  marvelous  growth.  So  the  outstanding  events  and  person- 
ages around  which  this  narrative  is  gathered  represent  some- 
what the  mass  and  moment  of  the  whole  undertaking;  they 
may  be  felt  to  include  those  activities  and  actors  whose 
influence,  no  less  important  if  less  conspicuous,  miderlies  and 
connects  the  epochal  scenes. 

The  purpose  of  the  book  being  to  show  the  growth  of  the 
Board,  it  was  desirable  that  the  story  of  one  mission  should  not 
get  unduly  ahead  of  another.  To  that  end  the  century  is 
divided  into  three  parts,  each  covering  approximately  a  gen- 
eration, and  in  each  period  the  ground  is  traversed  afresh  to 
show  the  progress  on  all  the  fields  during  that  portion  of  their 
history.  The  fixing  of  these  periods  and  their  designation  is 
at  best  artificial  and  approximate.  In  them  all  there  has  been 
Planting,  Watering,  and  Increase.  Yet  the  order  and  develop- 
ment which  these  divisions  indicate  have  characterized  this 
century  of  mission  work,  and  the  dates  set  as  boundaries, 
though  not  equally  exact  for  all  fields,  do  in  genera!  mark 
certain  turning-points  of  the  history  that  are  significant. 

Limitations  of  space  prevented  the  assigning  of  a  chapter  to 
each  mission.  Of  necessity  they  are  combined  into  fields, 
usually  by  countries,  a  chapter  being  given  to  each  field.  Dur- 
ing the  first  two  periods  the  account  of  each  mission  is  kept 
distinct  within  the  chapter,  the  narrative  moving  back  and 
forth  so  as  to  hold  the  field  together  in  chronological  view. 
The  danger  of  confusion  through  these  swdft  transitions  is 
believed  to  be  offset  by  the  advantage  of  a  more  comprehensive 
and  simultaneous  view  of  the  gi'owth  of  Christianity  in  an  em- 
pire. The  device  of  cut-in  headings  and  a  notably  full  index 
'svill  enable  the  reader  to  find  and  follow  any  desired  line  of 
inquiry.  In  some  cases,  notably  in  Chapter  V,  in  the  first 
period,  where  the  transitions  are  most  numerous  and  frequent, 
cross  references  are  inserted  to  facilitate  the  forming  o."  a  con- 


PREFACE  vii 

nected  story.  In  the  treatment  of  the  third  period  less  regard 
is  paid  to  the  precise  order  of  events  or  to  mission  boundaries, 
and  a  freer  handUng  of  the  material  is  ventured,  that  the  broad 
aspects  of  modern  missionary  undertakings  may  be  displayed 
more  amply  or  connectedly. 

The  spelling  of  names  of  places  in  mission  lands  is  ever  a 
perplexing  question.  In  many  of  these  countries  there  is  no 
fixed  usage.  Missionaries  in  the  same  field  adopt  different 
standards.  On  the  whole  it  was  determined  in  this  volume 
to  use  the  forms  that  have  been  common  and  familiar  among 
the  Board's  constituency  in  the  last  generation.  This  rule  has 
been  observed  also  for  the  most  part  in  the  making  of  the  maps, 
where  the  present  usage  of  the  map  makers  has  been  modi- 
fied in  the  case  of  the  Board's  location  ,  convenience  thus 
being  secured  at  the  expense  of  consistency.  In  the  maps 
of  China  the  new  Imperial  Post  Office  spellings  have  been 
accepted  throughout,  as  they  now  become  the  authoritative 
forms  to  be  used  in  correspondence;  the  familiar  names  have 
been  kept  in  the  text  as  registering  the  Board's  custom  at  least 
in  the  century  closed.  The  corresponding  ofiicial  spellings  in 
Ceylon,  which  radically  altered  the  traditional  usage  of  the 
Board,  having  been  adopted  by  it  several  years  ago,  are  indi- 
cated in  the  text  of  the  third  period  as  well  as  on  the  map 
of  Ceylon. 

The  material  available  for  a  historian  of  the  American 
Board  is  in  most  lines  abundant,  detailed,  and  reliable.  There 
is  far  more  of  it  than  one  who  reads  and  writes  amid  other  tasks 
can  hope  to  master.  The  huge  volumes  of  communications, 
official  and  personal,  between  the  Rooms  and  the  Missions 
are  in  themselves  an  unbroken  history  of  the  Board's  affairs  from 
the  beginning;  he  files  of  the  Missionary  Herald,  the  annual 
reports,  many  manuscript  notes,  reminiscences,  and  biographies 
in  which  missionaries  long  on  the  field  have  contributed 
to  the  Board's  library  their  personal  accounts  of  what  they 
have    observed,    all    are   storehouses  of  information.      Much 


viii  PREFACE 

of  this  material,  in  its  earlier  parts,  has  been  carefully  worked 
over  by  several  competent  hands;  by  Dr.  Joseph  Tracy  in  the 
History  of  the  American  Board  of  Commissioners  for  Foreign 
Missions,  sl  painstaking  and  accurate  record  of  the  first  thirty 
years  of  the  Board's  life;  by  Secretary  Rufus  Anderson  in  his 
authoritative  histories  of  separate  mission  fields  during  the 
first  sixty  years,  the  History  of  the  India  Missions,  the  Sand- 
wich Islands  Mission,  and  the  Missions  to  the  Oriental  Churches; 
and  by  Dr.  Samuel  C.  Bartlett  in  his  Sketches  of  the  Missions 
of  the  American  Board,  a  little  book  packed  with  informa- 
tion as  to  the  Board's  operations  during  the  same  sixty  years, 
and  so  full  of  life  and  color  that  it  should  never  drop  out  of 
sight  Of  late,  in  connection  with  the  jubilee  years  of  several 
missions,  and  in  some  cases  with  their  diamond  anniversaries, 
monographs  have  been  prepared  of  peculiar  historical  interest 
and  value.  Dr.  Edward  Warren  Capen's  extended  researches  in 
the  Board's  archives  and  among  the  records  of  the  Prudential 
Committee  have  made  available  also  valuable  notes  concerning 
the  proceedings  of  the  Board  and  of  its  representatives  at 
home  and  abroad. 

In  that  large  literature  of  missions  so  rapidly  becoming  a 
recognized  department  in  the  world  of  books,  the  fields  and 
the  forces  of  the  American  Board  are  well  represented.  To  the 
Lives  of  many  of  her  famous  missionaries,  and  to  their  own 
pubUshed  accounts  of  the  particular  fields  they  have  served, 
of  which  William  Goodell's  Forty  Years  in  the  Turkish  Empire, 
Cyrus  Hamhn's  My  Life  and  Times,  and  Josiah  Tyler's  Forty 
Years  among  the  Zidus  are  well-known  examples,  have  come 
of  late  important  general  treatises  like  Dr.  John  P.  Jones' 
India:  Its  Life  and  Thought  and  Dr.  Otis  Cary's  History  of 
Christianity  in  Japan,  which,  put  with  such  fruits  of  personal 
observations  as  Dr.  George  Washburn  has  garnered  in  his  Fifty 
Years  in  Constantinople  and  Recollections  of  Robert  College,  or 
the  late  Dr.  Henry  H.  Jessup  in  his  Fifty-three  Years  in  Syria, 
and  such  authoritative  works  as  Dr.  Julius  Richter's  History 


PREFACE  ix 

of  Protestant  Missions  in  the  Near  East  and  History  of  Missioiis 
in  India,  indicate  the  contributory  sources  of  knowledge  and 
of  just  understanding  which  are  at  the  disposal  of  the  student  of 
the  Board's  first  century.  To  these  and  many  othef  publi- 
cations, from  voluminous  works  to  fugitive  pamphlets,  the 
author  has  been  continually  indebted  both  for  information 
and  suggestion.  If  space  has  not  permitted  the  acknowledg- 
ment of  this  obligation  by  foot-notes  on  every  page,  their 
absence  must  not  be  interpreted  as  implying  that  there  is  no 
occasion  for  them. 

In  addition  to  the  benefit  of  a  full  and  trusty  literature  of  his 
subject,  the  author  gratefully  recognizes  the  aid  of  many  com- 
petent and  interested  friends  in  the  Board's  circle.  He  would 
make  special  mention  of  the  help  thus  derived  from  his  col- 
leagues in  the  Board  Rooms,  from  the  Prudential  Committee's 
Sub-Committee  on  Publications,  and  from  several  veteran  mis- 
sionaries of  the  Board,  home  on  furlough  or  now  retired,  who 
were  able  to  give  exact  and  authoritative  counsel  and  criticism 
as  to  the  treatment  of  particular  fields  or  periods. 

No  one  can  be  more  sensible  than  the  author  of  the  bare- 
ness and  incompleteness  of  this  account  of  the  Board's  first 
century.  It  was  begun  with  a  lively  sense  of  the  absolute 
necessity  of  compression.  Yet  more  than  a  third  of  what  was 
first  written  has  been  cut  out  to  bring  the  book  within  the 
extreme  limit  of  size.  If  to  many  readers,  especially  on  the 
mission  fields,  it  seems  a  meager  and  fragmentary  story,  it  is 
hoped  that  to  all  who  take  it  up  it  may  nevertheless  suggest 
something  of  the  scope  and  movement,  the  character  and  power 
of  a  truly  heroic  enterprise  to  which  for  a  hundred  years  some 
of  the  best  and  bravest  men  and  women  of  America  have  given 
their  lives.  Of  that  City  of  God  which  they  have  labored  to 
estabhsh  upon  earth  may  his  book  aid  in  numbering  the 
towers  —  to  tell  it  to  the  generation  following.  „ 

Jaffrey,  New  Hampshire, 
26  August,  1910. 


CONTENTS 


THE   PLANTING,    1810-1850 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

I     How  THE  Board  Began 3 

II     Starting  in  India  and  Ceylon 17 

III  Following  Indian  Trails 35 

IV  Transforming  the  Sandwich  Islands 56 

V     Reentering  Bible  Lands 80 

VI     Edging  into  China 108 

VII     Attempting  Aj^rica 124 

VIII     The  Period  of  Adolescence 140 

THE   WATERING,    1850-1880 

IX     In  British  India  and  Ceylon 165 

X     In  the  Land  op  the.Dakotas 186 

XI     In  Turkey  and  the  Levant    ........  196 

XII    In  Micronesia 227 

XIII  In  the  Empire  of  China 250 

XIV  In  the  Empire  of  Japan 263 

XV     In  the  Dark  Continent 279 

XVI     In  Nominally  Christian  Lands 290 

XVII     Approaching  Maturity 305 

THE   INCREASE,    1880-1910 

XVIII     A  Period  of  Expansion _     .      .  325 

XIX     Into  New  Fields 336 

XX     The  Farther  East 352 

XXI     The  Nearer  East 385 

XXII     Southern  Asia 413 

XXIII  Central  and  Southern  Africa 426 

XXIV  Islands  of  the  Pacific 440 

XXV     In  Papal  Lands 456 

XXVI    A  New  Era 475 

Appendix 495 

xi 


ILLUSTRATIONS 

PAGE 

THE  SALEM   TABERNACLE  AND  FOUR  OF  THE  FIRST 

MISSIONARIES 14 

Samuel  Newell,  Harriet  Atwood  Newell,  Adoniram 
JuDSON,  Jr.,  Ann  Haseltine  Judson. 

THE  STATION  AT  BRAINERD,  TENNESSEE 36 

THEN  AND  NOW  IN  THE  SANDWICH  ISLANDS      ...       57 
Central  Union  Church,  Honolulu,  and  Typical  Idols. 

REPRESENTATIVE  MISSIONARIES  (Earlier) 107 

MmoN  WiNSLOw,  Elias  Riggs,  William  Goodell,  Fidelia 
FisKE,  Aldin  Grout,  Justin  Perkins,  Peter  Parker. 

THE  "ROOMS"  IN  1860  AND  1910 153 

The  Board's  Building  in  Pemberton  Square 

The  General  Office  in  the  Congregational  House. 

SOME  FOUNDERS  AND  EARLY  OFFICERS 160 

Samuel  Worcester,  Jeremiah  Evarts,  John  Treadwell, 
Henry  Hill,  Samuel  Spring. 

SOME  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD  SHIPS 236 

Hiram  Bingham  II,  Morning  Stars  I,  II,  IV  and  V, 
Missionary  Packet. 

REPRESENTATIVE   NATIVE   LEADERS 272 

K.  M.  Dhalwami,  Joseph  Hardy  Neesima,  B.  Prochazka, 
Pastor  Chi  a,  Sarkis  Levonian,  James  Dube. 

LATER  OFFICERS  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD      ...     306 
RuFus  Anderson,  Nathaniel  G.  Clark,  Selah  B.  Treat, 
Langdon   S.   Ward,    Mark    Hopkins,    Edmund   K.   Alden, 
Richard  S.  Storrs,  John  O.  Means,  Judson  Smith,  Sarah  L. 

BOWKER. 

REPRESENTATIVE   MISSIONARIES    (Later) 321 

Titus  Coan,  Cyrus  Hamlin,  Stephen  R.  Riggs,  Eliza 
Agnew,  Samuel  B.  Fairbank,  John  L.  Stephens,  Marquis 
L.  Gordon. 

xiii 


xiv  ILLUSTRATIONS 

PAGE 

EDUCATIONAL  UNDERTAKINGS  IN  CHINA  AND  JAPAN  327 
A  Gymnastic  Class,  Peking;  Along  the  Doshisha  Campus; 
Union  College  of  Arts,  Tung-chou;  At  the  College  Door, 
TuNG-CHOu;  In  the  Laboratory,  Foochow  College;  A  Kyoto 
Kindergarten;  Union  Medical  College,  Peking;  A  Vista 
at  Kobe  College. 

SOME  LINES  OF  EVANGELISM 329 

Street  Preaching,  Madura,  India;  A  Bible  Reader  of 
Trebizond,  Turkey;  A  Woman's  Meeting  in  West  Africa; 
Tent  Meeting,  Bombay,  India;  Bookstore  and  Street 
Chapel,  Peking,  China;  A  Service  for  Patients  at  Ceylon 
Hospital. 

TWO  BOXER  MEMORIALS 381 

Church  and  Martyr  Cemetery,  Pao-ting-fu;  Memorial 
Arch,  Oberlin. 

GLIMPSES  OF  MEDICAL  ESTABLISHMENTS  IN  TURKEY    406 

Hospital  at  Aintab;  In  the  Babies'  Ward,  Aintab; 
Dispensary  Patients  at  Talas;  Hospital  ant)  Out-patients, 
SiVAs;  In  the  Operating  Room,  Harpoot;  Native  Nurses 
AT  Marsovan. 

MADURA'S    DIAMOND    JUBILEE 424 

The  March  of  the  Banners  of  the  Years,  The  New 
College  Building,  A  Section  of  the  Anniversary  Company. 

INDUSTRIAL   FEATURES    IN  VARIOUS    MISSIONS  ...     435 
Carpenter  Shop,  Amanzimtoti,  South  Africa;  Carpenter 
Shop,  Marsovan,  Turkey;  Sir  D.  M.  Petit  School  of  Indus- 
trial  Arts,    Ahmednagar,    India;    Uncovering  the   Kiln, 
Mt.  Silinda,  South  Africa;  The  Laundry,  Bombay,  India. 

DIAGRAM  SHOWING  COMPARATIVE  INCREASE  IN 
MISSIONARIES  AND  NATIVE  WORKERS  SINCE 
1825 475 

PLAN  OF  A  REPRESENTATIVE  MISSION  STATION     .     .     479 
Ahmednagar  Station  of  the  Marathi  Mission,  India. 


MAPS 

PAGE 

The  World  in  1810         Froniispiece 

The  Board's  Missions,  1810-1860 165 

The  Board's  Missions  in  1910 325 

West  Central  African  Mission 336 

Japan  Mission 352 

South  China  and  Foochow  Missions 368 

North  China  and  Shansi  Missions 380 

Asiatic  Turkey 

Eastern,  Central,  and  Western  Turkey  Missions      .      .  386 

European  Turkey  ]Mission 400 

Marathi  Mission,  India 414 

Madura  and  Ceylon  Missions 420 

South  African  Mission 427 

Micronesian  Mission 441 

Mission  to  the  Philippines 454 

Mission  to  Spain  and  Mission  to  Austria 456 

Mission  to  Mexico 468 


XV 


THE    PLANTING,    1810-1850 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN 
BOARD 

Chapter  I 
HOW  THE  BOARD  BEGAN 

Massachusetts  roads  were  not  boulevards  in  1810.  And 
there  were  then  no  automobiles  to  cover  the  six  miles  between 
The  Con-  Andover  and  Bradford  in  twice  as  many  minutes. 
ference  at  But  the  two  occupants  of  a  chaise  which  jogged 
Andover  Qver  that  country  highway  on  the  morning  of 
June  27  had  little  thought  of  the  road  or  the  rate  of  travel. 
They  were  not  due  in  Bradford  till  nine  o'clock,  and  it  was 
still  early.  Oblivious  to  the  dust  circling  about  them,  or  the 
charm  of  wayside  flowers  and  the  fresh  green  of  pastures  and 
hills,  they  spent  the  hours  of  that  drive  in  earnest  consultation. 

The  two  men  were  Rev.  Samuel  Worcester,  pastor  of  the 
Tabernacle  Church,  of  Salem,  and  Dr.  Samuel  Spring,  minister 
at  Newburyport.  They  had  come  to  Andover  from  Salem 
the  day  before  to  attend  a  conference  at  the  house  of  Prof. 
Moses  Stuart.  The  professors  of  Andover  Theological  Sem- 
inary, four  or  five  neighboring  pastors,  and  Mr.  Jeremiah 
Evarts,  a  layman  already  recognized  as  a  wise  and  influential 
counselor,  comprised  the  company.  A  band  of  four  Seminary 
students  had  set  their  hearts  upon  undertaking  a  Christian 
mission  in  some  foreign  land  and  desired  to  offer  a  memorial 
on  the  subject  to  the  General  Association  of  Massachusetts 
Proper,  a  recently  organized  body  of  conservative  Congre- 
gational ministers,  representing  the  more  evangelical  wing  of 
the  denomination,  which  was  to  hold  its  annual  meeting  in 
Bradford  the  next  day. 

The  conference  in  Professor  Stuart's  house  was  ''solemn, 
intellectual,  and  devotional."     Samuel  Newell  spoke  for  the 

3 


4      STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

students.  The  project  was  then  discussed.  All  honored  the 
motive  and  devotion  of  the  young  men,  but  there  were  mis- 
givings; to  one  adviser,  at  least,  they  seemed  infatuated.  The 
calm  but  approving  arguments  of  Messrs.  Worcester,  Evarts, 
and  Stuart,  the  passionate  appeal  of  Dr.  Griffin,  and  the  warn- 
ing of  one  of  the  conferees,  that  they  had  better  not  try  to 
stop  God,  at  length  prevailed;  the  judgment  of  the  conference 
on  the  whole  favored  the  proposal. 

It  was  of  this  new  and  stupendous  undertaking  that  Dr. 
Worcester  and  Dr.  Spring  talked  as  they  drove;  of  what  it 
involved  for  those  who  should  go  to  the  field,  and  for  those 
at  home  who  should  support  them;  of  the  growing  missionary 
interest  among  American  Christians,  of  the  prospects  of  a 
foreign  missionary  society,  and  of  the  best  way  to  form  it. 
By  the  time  they  reached  Bradford  the  plan  of  the  forth- 
coming society  was  framed  in  their  minds.  Even  a  name  for 
it  was  provided  —  undoubtedly  the  suggestion  of  Mr.  Worces- 
ter—  ''Board  of  Commissioners  for  Foreign  Missions,"  to  which 
cumbrous  but  weighty  title  the  organization  itself,  at  its  first 
meeting,  was  to  prefix  the  word  "American." 

It  was  on  the  second  day  of  the  Association's  meeting  at 
Bradford,  and  apparently  in  the  church  to  which  adjournment 
The  was  taken  from  the  small  Academy  building  where 

Bradford  the  first  session  was  held,  that  the  four  young  men 
Meeting  from  Andover  Seminary  were  introduced  and  pre- 
sented the  following  paper,  prepared  by  Mr.  Judson: 

"The  undersigned,  members  of  the  Divinity  College,  respect- 
fully request  the  attention  of  their  reverend  fathers,  convened 
in  the  General  Association  at  Bradford,  to  the  following  state- 
ment and  inquiries. 

"They  beg  leave  to  state  that  their  minds  have  long  been 
impressed  with  the  duty  and  importance  of  personally  attempt- 
ing a  mission  to  the  heathen;  that  the  impressions  on  their 
minds  have  induced  a  serious,  and,  they  trust,  a  prayerful 
consideration  of  the  subject  in  its  various  attitudes,  parti cu- 


HOW  THE  BOARD  BEGAN  5 

larly  in  relation  to  the  probable  success,  and  the  difficulties 
attending  such  an  attempt;  and  that,  after  examining  all  the 
information  which  they  can  obtain,  they  consider  themselves 
as  devoted  to  this  work  for  life,  whenever  God,  in  his  provi- 
dence, shall  open  the  way. 

''They  now  offer  the  following  inquiries,  on  which  they 
solicit  the  opinion  and  advice  of  this  Association.  Whether, 
with  their  present  views  and  feelings,  they  ought  to  renounce 
the  object  of  missions,  as  either  visionary  or  impracticable;  if 
not,  whether  they  ought  to  direct  their  attention  to  the  eastern 
or  western  world;  whether  they  may  expect  patronage  and 
support  from  a  missionary  society  in  this  country  or  must 
commit  themselves  to  the  direction  of  a  European  society;  and 
what  preparatory  measures  they  ought  to  take  previous  to 
actual  engagement. 

''The  undersigned,  feeling  their  youth  and  inexperience, 
look  up  to  their  fathers  in  the  church,  and  respectfully  solicit 
their  advice,  direction,  and  prayers. 

'^Adoniram  Judson,  Jr. 

''Samuel  Nott,  Jr. 

''Samuel  J.  Mills, 

"Samuel  Newell." 

That  there  were  only  four  names  signed  to  this  memorial 
rather  than  six  was  due  to  the  fact  that  two  other  students 
were  held  back  lest  there  should  be  alarm  over  the  numbers. 
Inasmuch  as  the  Association  was  but  eight  years  old  and  had 
present  at  that  meeting  but  nineteen  appointed  delegates,  no 
business  of  special  importance  being  generally  anticipated,  it 
was  not  strange  that  caution  was  felt  to  be  necessary. 

The  formal  statement  was  quietly  received  and,  after  some 
more  particular  and  individual  testimonies  from  the  young 
men,  was  referred  to  a  committee  of  three,  consisting  of  Messrs. 
Spring,  Worcester,  and  Hale,  the  last  named  being  secretary 
of  the  Association.     Evidently  it  was  meant  that  the  appeal 


6  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

should  pass  into  kindly  hands.  When  the  committee  reported 
the  following  day,  Friday,  the  29th,  approving  the  purpose 
of  the  young  men  and  recommending  the  organization  of  a 
foreign  missionary  board  upon  a  plan  submitted,  the  report 
was  at  once  and  unanimously  adopted.  The  plan  provided 
that  the  Board  should  consist  of  nine  members,  and  that  while 
the  Association  should  in  the  first  instance  choose  all,  the 
Association  of  Connecticut  should  be  invited  thereafter  to 
cooperate  by  choosing  four  of  the  nine.  Later,  upon  th6  secur- 
ing of  a  charter,  the  right  of  electing  members  was  transferred 
to  the  Board  itself.  The  Association  then  elected  the  follow- 
ing nine  men  to  membership  in  the  Board,  leaving  to  them 
the  working  out  of  details  of  organization:  His  Excellency 
John  Treadwell,  Esq.,  Rev.  Dr.  Timothy  Dwight,  Gen.  Jede- 
diah  Huntington,  and  Rev.  Calvin  Chapin,  of  Connecticut; 
Rev.  Dr.  Joseph  Lyman,  Rev.  Dr.  Samuel  Spring,  William 
Bartlet,  Esq.,  Rev.  Samuel  Worcester,  and  Dea.  Samuel  H. 
Walley,  of  Massachusetts. 

Although  the  action  that  originated  the  American  Board 
was  thus  short  and  simple,  it  is  not  to  be  inferred  that  it  was 
taken  with  full  assurance  and  unqualified  enthusiasm.  The 
whole  procedure  forms  a  striking  example  of  the  power  of  a 
few  strong  and  determined  men  to  lead  others.  The  advo- 
cacy of  the  project  by  those  who  came  from  Andover,  notably 
by  Jeremiah  Evarts,  carried  the  day.  One  who  was  present 
at  the  meeting  noted  this  characteristic:  '^Perhaps  never  was 
the  value  of  an  intelligent  leading  influence  more  clearly  shown; 
perhaps  never  was  such  an  influence  more  needed  or  more 
gladly  acknowledged.  One  thing  was  prominent  and  uni- 
versal, viz.,  a  deep  sense  of  the  sublime  position  and  devout 
consecration  of  this  missionary  band.  They  were  unpre- 
tending, modest,  of  a  tender,  childlike  spirit,  well  understand- 
ing their  aim,  consecrated,  a  felt  power.  The  attitude  of  the 
meeting  was  about  this:  no  direct  opposition,  a  weak  faith,  a 
genial  hope,  rather  leaning  to  a  waiting  posture.     It  obviously 


HOW  THE  BOARD  BEGAN  7 

was  a  relief  to  a  portion  of  the  body  that  the  subject  was  put 
into  the  hands  of  such  men  as  those  who  composed  the  Board. 
I^  the  right  sense  they  were  marked  men,  well  suited  to  the 
emergency.  This  seemed  to  lift  somewhat  the  pressure  of  the 
responsibility.  .  The  feeling  was,  Try  it;  if  the  project  fail,  it 
would  have,  from  such  men,  an  honorable  burial." 

But,  in  truth,  the  American  Board  began  long  before  its 
organization  in  1810.  To  find  its  origin  one  must  go  back 
of  Bradford  and  Andover;  back  to  WiUiamstown 
^  ^^  ®^  and  its  haystack  and  groves,  where  in  1806  a  dozen 
young  college  students,  led  by  Samuel  J.  Mills, 
were  pouring  out  to  one  another  and  to  God  the  sorrow  of 
their  hearts  over  the  moral  darkness  of  Asia,  and  where  as 
they  faced  the  need  of  sending  the  gospel  to  that  far  land, 
their  faith  rose  to  affirm,  ''We  can,  if  we  will,"  which  goading 
word  led  them  in  1808  to  form  the  society  of  ''The  Brethren," 
whose  object  was  "to  effect  in  the  persons  of  its  members  a 
mission  or  missions  to  the  heathen,"  and  whose  five  charter 
members,  signing  the  constitution,  thus  pledged  themselves  to 
this  life  service.  Like  the  Jesuits  in  the  secrecy  of  their  organ- 
ization and  in  the  subjection  of  individual  choices  to  the  will 
of  the  order,  but  without  guile.  The  Brethren  became  a  potent 
force  for  missions  in  Williams  College,  and  afterward  at  Andover 
Seminary,  as  with  the  coming  of  some  of  its  founders  to  that 
institution  in  1810  it  found  there  its  natural  home  and  seat 
of  influence. 

At  Andover  the  group  from  Williams  met  some  like-minded 
men  from  other  colleges,  three  of  whom  were  promptly  enrolled 
among  The  Brethren:  Adoniram  Judson,  Jr.,  from  Brown, 
Samuel  Newell  from  Harvard,  and  Samuel  Nott,  Jr.,  from 
Union  College.  Judson,  ardent,  ambitious,  a  born  leader,  now 
took  the  initiative  in  the  society.  Mills  contentedly  slipping 
into  less  conspicuous  but  no  less  efficient  place.  With  this 
union  of  eager  hearts  and  alert  and  determined  minds  it  was 
inevitable  that  The  Brethren  should  infuse  somewhat  of  their 


8  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

missionary  zeal  into  all  they  met;  into  their  Seminary,  then 
in  its  formative  and  most  impressionable  years,  and  among 
the  ministers  and  churches  of  their  acquaintance  throughout 
New  England.  Williamstown  led  to  Andover,  and  Andover 
to  Bradford. 

Back  of  Williamstown  and  accounting  for  Mills  and  the 
haystack,  as  for  Andover  Seminary  itself,  was  the  period  of 
religious  revival  which  blessed  New  England  as  the  eighteenth 
century  turned  into  the  nineteenth.  The  tides  of  religious  life 
had  reached  a  low  ebb  after  the  Revolutionary  War  and  before 
the  welcome  change  began.  Infidelity  was  general  and  ram- 
pant. Educated  men  boasted  of  skepticism.  The  colleges 
were  noisy  with  it.  The  reaction  from  the  ^reat  /kwakening 
and  its  surge  of  emotions  was  complete.  Then  came  quietly 
a  gradual  renewal  of  religious  desire.  It  appeared  first  in  Con- 
necticut and  soon  was  felt  in  Mills'  home  county  of  Litchfield. 
At  length  the  fire  of  it  warmed  his  heart,  kept  tender  by  the 
love  of  his  saintly  mother,  who  had  been  ever  his  confidante, 
and  whose  word  once  to  a  friend,  ''I  have  consecrated  this 
child  to  the  service  of  God  as  a  missionary,"  the  child 
had  overheard.  But  it  was  not  till  academy  Hfe  was  opening 
that  Mills,  then  seventeen  years  of  age,  after  a  somewhat 
stormy  experience  of  religious  questioning,  came  forth  into 
clear  and  happy  discipleship.  Almost  at  once  he  caught  the 
missionary  vision  and  responded  to  its  appeal.  Entering 
Williams  College  to  fit  himself  for  this  service,  he  brought  to 
it  the  inspiration  of  a  great  soul  devoted  to  a  great  idea. 

As  the  spirit  of  this  revival  spread  from  Connecticut  to 
Massachusetts  it  divided  yet  more  sharply  the  so-called  ortho- 
dox and  liberal  parties  of  the  time.  The  reaction  became 
stronger  against  those  tendencies  of  religious  thought  and 
temper  which,  under  the  name  of  Unitarianism,  were  soon  to 
split  the  Congregational  churches  into  two  denominations. 
Against  these  tendencies  the  evangelical  party  now  set  itself 
determinedly  and  to  that  end  created  one  after  another,  in 


HOW  THE  BOARD  BEGAN  9 

quick  succession,  those  agencies  and  institutions,  some  of  which 
have  been  already  named,  that  were  most  intimately  associated 
with  the  origin  of  the  Board. 

And  back  of  this  evangelical  reawakening  and  inwrought  with 
it  as  an  originating  force  in  the  creating  of  the  American  Board 
were  the  new  missionary  enterprises  starting  in  the  mother 
country,  reports  of  which  were  being  eagerly  read  by  many 
earnest  Christians  in  America,  and  to  which  many  gifts  were 
going  from  this  land;  also  the  missionary  societies  already 
formed  in  Connecticut  and  Massachusetts,  with  domestic 
missions  indeed  mainly  in  view,  but  not  altogether  so; 
and  yet  farther  back,  even  to  the  beginning  of  American  his- 
tory, a  succession  of  broad-visioned  and  devoted  men  who 
from  generation  to  generation  had  sounded  the  call  for  mis- 
sionary effort  or  had  made  some  earnest  attempts  to  minister 
to  those  to  whom  the  gospel  had  not  come,  to  the  Indians,  or 
the  Africans,  or  other  disadvantaged  races.  It  was  indeed  a 
rebirth  of  the  purpose  which  animated  the  Pilgrim  Fathers 
and  which  had  never  been  altogether  lost  by  their  descendants 
that  produced  the  American  Board.  From  the  glowing  heart 
of  a  religious  revival  whose  warmth  cleared  away  the  fogs 
of  infidelity,  revived  Christianity,  founded  Andover  Seminary, 
and  built  Park  Street  Church,  Boston,  came  also  this  first  for- 
eign missionary  society  of  America  to  fulfil  the  desire  and  hope 
of  those  men  of  Plymouth  who  sought  to  be  stepping-stones 
for  other  adventurers  in  carrying  the  gospel  to  the  world. 

The  action,  at  Bradford,  which  constituted  the  American 
Board  was  hardly  exhilarating  to  the  young  men  eager  to 

find    themselves    on    mission    ground.     For,    while 

Ardor  and  •        xu   •  j  •  ± 

p      .  approvmg  their  purpose  and  organizmg  a  society 

to  promote  it,  the  General  Association  advised  them 
diligently  to  pursue  their  studies  and  humbly  to  wait  the  open- 
ings and  guidance  of  Providence.  And  when,  ten  weeks  later, 
September  5,  the  first  meeting  of  the  American  Board  was 
held  at  Farmington,  Conn.,  it  recorded  a  similar  vote  of  approval 


10     STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

and  advice,  intimating  that  any  appointment  of  missionaries 
must  wait  upon  fuller  information  concerning  fields  and  a 
more  assured  financial  outlook.  Then,  having  elected  officers 
and  an  executive  or  Prudential  Committee,  adopted  rules  of 
action,  and  issued  a  stately  appeal  to  the  Christian  public, 
the  Board  adjourned  for  a  year. 

The  Prudential  Committee,  likewise,  upon  surveying  the 
task,  was  of  the  opinion  that  it  would  be  some  time  before 
they  could  secure  funds  to  maintain  a  mission  "upon  a  prom- 
ising scale."  At  this  prospect  of  delay  the  would-be  mission- 
aries chafed;  their  sponsors  and  advisers  on  the  Board's  Com- 
mittee were  also  unwilling  merely  to  wait  for  the  way  to  open. 
Accordingly  it  was  voted  to  send  Mr.  Judson  to  London  to 
confer  with  the  London  Missionary  Society,  partly  for  informa- 
tion as  to  mission  fields,  but  chiefly  as  to  the  possibility  of 
some  combination  between  the  two  societies  in  maintaining 
missionary  work.  Judson  had  alread}'  opened  negotiations 
with  the  London  Society,  having  written  in  April  preceding 
as  to  the  desire  of  himself  and  his  fellow  students  for  foreign 
missionary  service  and  asking  if  the  Society  would  be  willing 
to  receive  them  into  its  training-school  at  Gosport  the  next 
spring,  preparatory  to  work  under  its  auspices.  The  awakening 
of  foreign  missionary  zeal  in  the  United  States  and  the  forma- 
tion of  the  American  Board  had  interrupted  that  correspond- 
ence in  which  the  London  Missionary  Society  had  cordially 
engaged.  But  now  that  the  students  were  beginning  again 
to  despair  of  going  forth  with  American  support,  Judson  was 
ready  at  once  to  undertake  the  errand  proposed  by  the  Pruden- 
tial Committee. 

Leaving  Boston  early  in  January,  1811,  and  after  an  exciting 
voyage  in  which  his  ship  was  captured  by  a  French  privateer 
and  Judson  himself  was  imprisoned  at  Bayonne,  he  reached 
London  just  before  the  May  anniversary  and  there  spent  six 
weeks  in  consultation.  Courteously  received  by  the  sister 
society,   this  representative  of  the  American  Board  made  a 


HOW  THE   BOARD   BEGAN  11 

strong  impression.  Tall  and  slight  of  figure,  of  a  delicate 
appearance,  but  with  bright  countenance  and  a  powerful  voice, 
by  his  impassioned  speech  Judson  commanded  attention.  A 
London  clerg>Tnan,  introducing  him  as  purposing  to  be  a 
missionary,  added,  ''and  if  his  faith  is  proportioned  to  his 
voice  he  will  drive  the  devil  from  all  India."  The  inquiries 
and  overtures  which  Judson  had  to  present  to  the  London 
Society  were  naive  at  least  in  their  form:  whether  the  Lon- 
don Society,  if  need  be,  would  support  for  a  time  these  young 
men,  without  requiring  full  or  final  authority  in  directing  them; 
whether  a  joint  support  by  the  two  societies  were  feasible; 
and  if  so.  which  should  direct  the  mission.  In  its  very 
first  measure  the  Committee  justified  its  title  to  the  name 
"Prudential."  It  did  not  intend  to  put  out  of  its  hand  aught 
of  what  had  been  entrusted  to  it.  but  sought  to  avail  itself  of 
ever>'  possible  ally  in  making  the  most  of  its  opportunit}'. 

The  London  Society  natm-ally  dechned  to  enter  into  a  joint 
administration  at  such  long  range  and  urged  the  hope  that 
the  American  churches  would  respond  to  the  call  of  this  emer- 
gent need.  At  the  same  time  the  directors  promised  that,  if 
necessary',  they  would  receive  Mr.  Judson  and  his  friends 
as  their  missionaries,  and  support  them  until  they  were  able 
to  maintain  thiemselves,  the  principle  of  self-sustaining  mis- 
sionaries being  then  approved  ere  experience  had  shown  its 
fallacy. 

At  the  second  annual  meeting  of  the  Board  at  Worcester, 
September  18,  ISll,  the  Committee  reported  concerning  Mr. 
Judson 's  visit  and  its  results,  and  recommended  that  the  Board 
retain  the  young  men  as  its  own  missionaries,  in  reUance 
on  the  di^-ine  favor  as  it  should  be  expressed  in  generous 
giving  by  the  Christian  pubUc  to  pro^*ide  their  support.  The 
fact  was  that  the  pride  of  the  Committee  and  of  the  Board 
was  a  Httle  touched  at  the  reply  from  England,  and  yet  more  by 
the  discovery-  that  their  missionary  candidates  had  almost  aban- 
doned hope  of  being  sent  oTit  from  .America  and  that  Judson 


12  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

had  brought  back  commissions  from  London  for  himself  and 
his  associates.  The  impetuous  and  strong-willed  nature  of 
Judson  would  not  brook  longer  delay.  He  and  Nott,  at  least, 
went  to  Worcester  determined  if  the  Board  did  not  act  promptly 
to  accept  appointment  under  the  English  Society.  This  atti- 
tude, though  somewhat  irritating  to  the  cautious  founders  of 
the  Board,  yet  had  the  desired  effect.  At  that  meeting  four 
of  the  men,  Judson,  Nott,  Newell,  and  Hall,  were  appointed 
missionaries  of  the  Board,  and  two  others,  Richards  and 
Warren,  were  taken  under  its  direction  and  patronage  while 
they  completed  their  theological  studies  at  Andover  and  took 
a  course  of  medical  lectures  at  Dartmouth  College.  The  field 
to  which  these  men  should  be  assigned  was  left  open  to  the 
judgment  of  the  Prudential  Committee,  though  three  locations 
in  Asia,  the  Burman  Empire,  Surat,  and  the  Prince  of  Wales 
Island  (Penang)  were  proposed  in  the  vote. 

It  is  surprising  not  to  find  the  name  of  Mills,  the  originator 
of  this  student  band,  and  the  first  of  all  the  young  men  to 
devote  himself  to  the  foreign  missionary  life  in  the  list  of  these 
appointees.  To  be  sure,  he  had  almost  a  year  of  study  yet 
before  him  in  the  Seminary,  while  Gordon  Hall  was  already 
graduated.  Yet  there  are  suggestions  of  other  reasons  oper- 
ating in  that  hidden  council  of  The  Brethren  to  which  each 
member  submitted  the  decision  of  his  course.  Mills  himself 
came  to  feel  that  he  was  not  so  well  fitted  for  the  conduct  of 
work  on  the  field  as  were  some  of  his  comrades;  moreover, 
he  had  proved  himself  peculiarly  adapted  to  promote  the 
missionary  cause  at  home  in  arousing  the  churches,  in  devis- 
ing new  agencies  and  organizations  for  furthering  the  gospel, 
and  in  tours  of  exploration  opening  up  new  fields  to  be 
entered.  Through  all  his  Andover  days,  and  to  the  last  hour 
of  his  short  but  crowded  life,  he  was  busy  serving  the  ends 
of  that  kingdom  in  whose  behalf  he  helped  to  originate  the 
American  Board. 

The  faith  and  determination  of  the  Board  to  undertake  its 


HOW  THE  BOARD  BEGAN  13 

appointed  task  were  doubtless  stimulated  by  the  report  at 
ju  A  _  Worcester  that  $1400  had  so  far  been  received 
pointment  from  donations  for  that  purpose,  and  still  more 
of  the  First  by  the  announcement  of  a  bequest  of  $30,000  from 
Mission-  ^/[^s.  Mary  Norris  of  Salem.  Although  this  noble 
*"®^  legacy  was  not  actually  received  for  two  years,  yet 

it  encouraged  the  little  circle  of  the  Board's  supporters  to  feel 
that  money  could  be  secured  for  this  adventurous  enterprise. 
The  appointment  of  its  first  missionaries  committing  it  to 
aggressive  action,  the  Board's  officers  now  earnestly  set  about 
interesting  pastors  and  friends,  while  the  students  at  Andover 
gave  themselves  to  vigorous  efforts  to  secure  funds.  These 
efforts  were  made  the  more  definite  and  urgent  by  word 
received  in  January,  1812,  from  Philadelphia,  whither  Newell 
and  Hall  had  gone  for  some  medical  studies,  after  their  gradu- 
ation at  Andover,  that  the  ship  Harmony  was  to  sail  for  Cal- 
cutta in  about  two  weeks  and  would  receive  missionaries  as 
passengers.  The  prospect  of  a  new  war  and  the  further  block- 
ade of  ports  made  this  seem  an  opportunity  not  to  be  lost. 

What  should  be  done?  Money  was  not  in  hand  sufficient 
to  pay  even  the  passage  fees.  The  committee  deliberated 
anxiously.  Could  they  safely  anticipate  that  the  interest 
roused  by  the  despatch  of  these  first  missionaries  would  hasten 
and  increase  gifts?  At  last,  January  27,  they  voted  to  send  the 
four  men,  but  to  detain  the  wives  for  a  while,  till  the  treasury 
should  be  refilled.  Or,  if  that  were  not  possible,  perhaps  the 
London  Missionary  Society  would  after  all  render  help.  Three 
days  later  they  added  to  the  list,  with  some  dismay  at  what 
they  were  doing,  but  because  they  dared  not  reject  his  request, 
the  name  of  Luther  Rice. 

The  Board  had  already  satisfied  itself  of  the  qualifications 

of  its  four  earliest  candidates,  the  Prudential  Com- 

Q  ,.      .       mittee  having  examined  them  at  a  meeting  held  in 

Salem  on  Christmas  Day,  1810,  just  prior  to  Judson's 

leaving  for  his  visit  to  England.     But  now  that  the  time  had 


14     STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

come  to  send  them  forth  it  was  proper  they  should  be  ordained 
to  the  ministry  according  to  Congregational  usage.  A  small 
council  was  called  to  meet  in  the  Tabernacle  Church,  Salem, 
Thursday,  February  6.  The  other  churches  invited  were  the 
North  of  Newburyport  and  the  Congregational  Church  of 
Charlestown,  with  Dr.  Griffin  of  Park  Street  Church,  Boston, 
and  Professors  Wood  and  Stuart  of  Andover  Seminary,  where 
Dr.  Griffin  had  also  been  professor,  as  personally  invited  mem- 
bers. The  young  men  were  thus  decidedly  in  the  hands  of 
their  friends. 

The  day  of  ordination  proved  fiercely  cold,  yet  the  church 
was  crowded.  Not  only  were  the  representative  people  of 
Salem  present,  but  visitors  came  from  far  and  near.  Students 
from  Andover  Seminary  and  Phillips  Academy  walked  to  and 
from  Salem  in  order  to  attend  the  service,  whose  proceedings 
were  followed  with  almost  breathless  interest.  The  spectacle 
of  these  talented  and  trained  young  men,  before  whom  life 
opened  so  promisingly,  committing  themselves  to  the  hazard 
of  a  foreign  mission,  arrested  the  attention  of  all  classes  in 
the  community.  And  the  eyes  of  the  congregation  were  not 
less  attracted  to  the  faces  of  two  young  women  who  were 
present,  one  Mr.  Judson's  bride  of  a  day,  the  other  the  prom- 
ised wife  of  Newell.  On  that  29th  of  June,  1810,  when  the 
Board  was  organized  in  Bradford,  the  dinner  was  furnished 
the  young  men  from  Andover  in  the  home  of  a  Bradford  citizen, 
Deacon  John  Haseltine.  Judson  was  noticeably  quiet  and 
absorbed  during  the  meal.  Later  it  transpired  that  he  was 
composing  some  verses  in  honor  of  the  beautiful  and  lively 
daughter  of  the  house,  Ann  Haseltine,  who  waited  upon  the 
guests  and  who  at  length  consented  to  become  the  wife  of 
the  prospective  missionary.  Scarcely  had  Miss  Haseltine  con- 
fided to  her  friend,  Harriet  Atwood,  living  just  across  the 
river  in  Haverhill,  her  expectation  of  missionary  life  in  India, 
than  Judson's  friend  Newell  met  Miss  Atwood,  and  in  the 
spring  of  1811  they,  too,  became  affianced  and  faced  together 


HARRIET  ATWOOD 
NEWELL 


n 


m' 


y®r'"'/- 


SAMUEL    NEWELL 


►^«^ 


fSfSJ^ICi"    rf 


THE    TABERNACLE    IN    1812 


ANN    HASELTINE 
JUDSON 


ADONIRAM  JUDSON,  JR. 


THE     SALEM     TABERNACLE    AND     FOUR     OF     THE     FIRST 
MISSIONARIES 


HOW  THE  BOARD  BEGAN  15 

the  prospect  of  a  foreign  mission  field.  As  both  these  young 
women  were  of  well-reputed  famihes,  fully  educated  accord- 
ing to  the  standards  of  the  time,  and  socially  prominent  in  the 
region,  their  committal  to  this  new  project  deepened  the  excite- 
ment of  that  ordination  day  in  the  Salem  Tabernacle. 

One  of  that  congregation,  William  Goodell,  himself  afterward 
a  distinguished  missionary  of  this  Board,  but  then  a  mere 
country  boy  who  had  trudged  over  from  Phillips  Academy, 
and  who  was  so  exhausted  with  exploring  the  novel  sights  of 
the  sea-faring  town  and  with  the  exposure  of  his  long  walk  in  the 
bitter  cold  that  he  could  hardly  hold  his  eyes  open,  records 
the  impressiveness  of  the  scene.  The  crowded  church,  the 
eminent  ministers  participating  in  the  exercises,  the  group  of 
young  men  taking  their  solemn  vows,  the  stirring  of  imagina- 
tion over  the  significance  and  reach  of  what  was  being  done, 
keyed  feelings  to  highest  pitch.  At  times  the  entire  assembly 
"seemed  moved  as  the  trees  of  the  wood  are  moved  by  a 
mighty  wind." 

On  that  same  evening  Messrs.  Nott,  Hall,  and  Rice  left 
for  Philadelphia,  supposing  that  they  had  just  time  to  catch 
the  Harmony  before  she  sailed.  The  Judsons  and 
Deoarture  ^^^^^^^  remained  in  Salem  awaiting  the  sailing  of 
the  Caravan,  a  brigantine  which,  it  had  transpired 
some  ten  days  before,  was  about  leaving  Salem  for  Calcutta; 
whereupon  it  was  thought  wiser  to  divide  the  company.  Delays 
occurred  in  the  sailing  of  both  vessels,  trying  to  the  spirits  of 
the  ready  and  eager  missionaries,  but  bringing  relief  to  the 
Board's  officers,  who  saw  the  treasury  fast  filling.  It  happened 
as  had  been  hoped.  When  it  was  known,  not  merely  that  the 
Board  desired  or  even  proposed  to  send  out  missionaries,  but 
that  they  were  embarking,  the  hearts  of  many  loyal  friends 
were  prompted  to  help  and  gifts  flowed  in  from  all  quarters. 
Within  three  weeks  of  the  decision  to  send  out  the  missionaries 
in  faith,  more  than  $6000  was  collected.  By  the  time  the 
Caravan  sailed  it  was  possible  to  furnish  them  not  only  with 


16  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

their  full  outfits,  but  with  a  year's  salary  in  advance,  which, 
considering  disturbed  conditions  and  the  difficulty  in  trans- 
porting money,  was  indeed  fortunate.  In  similar  way,  offerings 
of  friends  in  the  neighborhood  of  Philadelphia  fully  equipped 
those  who  sailed  on  the  Harmony. 

At  length  the  hopes  and  prayers  of  many  years  were  ful- 
filled; the  project,  which  had  been  successively  a  vision,  an 
idea,  a  desire,  a  resolve,  and  a  plan,  became  an  accomplished 
fact.  On  February  19  the  Caravan  sailed  from  Salem,  carrying 
the  Judsons  and  the  Newells;  the  Harmony,  with  Mr.  and  Mrs. 
Nott,  and  Messrs.  Hall  and  Rice,  finally  got  away  from  the 
Delaware  Cape  on  the  24th.  The  Board  was  launched  upon 
its  far  enterprise. 


Chapter  II 

STARTING   IN   INDIA  AND  CEYLON 

The  Caravan  arrived  at  Calcutta  June  17,  1812.     The  mis- 
sionaries did  not  have  to  wait  long  for  their  trials;  strangely, 
the  first  opposition  was  not  from  the  people  of  the 

„  °  ^.  land,  but  from  men  of  their  own  race.  The  East 
Reception  ,       ^  ,  »  .   ,        .    ., 

India  Company,  whose  tenure  of  special  privilege 

was  then  being  sharply  protested  in  England,  was  doing  its 
utmost  to  keep  missionaries  out  of  the  country  where  their 
observant  eyes  were  dreaded.  Sydney  Smith's  brilhant  lam- 
poons in  the  Edinburgh  Review  sought  to  rout  from  India  the 
"nest  of  consecrated  cobblers."  Thus  far  the  British  govern- 
ment had  not  refused  to  maintain  the  rights  of  its  own  citizens 
already  engaged  in  missionary  work  in  these  far-off  possessions; 
for  Americans,  with  whom  England  was  on  the  brink  of  war, 
there  was  no  opening. 

Ten  days  after  their  arrival  the  governor-general  commanded 
Judson  and  Newell  to  return  to  America  on  the  Caravan.  At 
first  there  seemed  nothing  else  to  do;  Burma  was  closed,  appeals 
to  enter  other  parts  of  India  were  unavaihng.  When  letters 
came  from  their  brethren  on  the  Harmony  at  the  Isle  of  France 
(Mauritius)  saying  that  the  governor  of  that  island  desired 
missionaries,  the  way  seemed  plain.  Here  was  territory  not 
under  the  control  of  the  East  India  Company;  might  they  go 
there?  Permission  was  granted.  The  first  vessel  to  sail  could 
take  but  two  passengers;  the  Newells  sailed  in  her,  the  Judsons 
were  to  follow. 

When  the  Harmony  reached  Calcutta  a  few  days  later,  its 

17 


18     STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

party  met  a  similar  reception.  As  they  were  about  to  be 
despatched  Avith  the  fleet  to  England,  being  consigned  to  the 
gunners'  mess,  they  fled  under  cover  of  the  night.  Adopting 
disguises  and  running  heavy  risks,  like  escaping  prisoners,  they 
all  managed  to  get  away,  the  Judsons  to  Burma  and  Messrs. 
Hall  and  Nott  to  Bombay. 

Bombay  proved  hardly  a  better  landing-place  for  mission- 
aries than  Calcutta.     The  first  visit  of  the  new  arrivals  was 
to  the  police  court.     War  was  now  declared  between 

^^     !        England  and  the  United  States.     It  was  charged 
at  Bombay  ^  ,   ,    .      .  ,.  .... 

that  a  vessel  brmgmg  supplies  to  the  missionaries 

had  really  been  sent  to  inform  American  ships;  a  pohtical  plot 

was  suspected.     Repeated  orders,  which  the  friendly  governor, 

Sir  Evan  Nepean,  could  not  delay  much  longer  to  execute, 

called  for  the  sending  of  the  missionaries  at  once  to  England. 

An  unsuccessful  attempt  to  join  Newell,  now  in  Ceylon,  resulted 

in  the  return  of  the  fugitives  from  Cochin  under  arrest  and 

heavy  suspicion. 

Yet  the  bearing  and  argument  of  these  hard-pressed  men, 
who  justified  their  effort  to  get  away  by  Paul's  escape  at  Damas- 
cus, favorably  impressed  the  magistrate.  Hall's  skill  in  stating 
his  case  and  his  boldness  in  facing  officials  recall,  in  these  par- 
ticulars also,  the  first  apostle  to  the  Gentiles.  The  mission- 
aries would  sign  no  bond  not  to  leave  Bombay  without  per- 
mission, nor  give  their  parole,  not  even  for  a  day  ahead.  Rather 
would  they  appeal  to  the  governor  as  a  Christian  man  and  a 
just  ruler  not  to  defeat  the  pious  object  of  their  endeavor. 

On  December  22,  1813,  nearly  six  months  after  their  arrival 
at  Bombay,  they  were  told  they  might  remain  awaiting  further 
instructions.  Not  until  two  years  later  did  they  learn  that 
by  the  efforts  of  active  friends  in  England,  notably  of  Sir 
Charles  Grant  and  William  Wilberforce,  the  East  India  Com- 
pany had  accepted  that  interpretation  of  the  renewed  charter 
which  permitted  missionaries  to  work  in  the  land,  under  cer- 
tain conditions. 


STARTING  IN  INDIA  AND  CEYLON  19 

The  early  troubles  were  not  all  from  without.     While  still 
in  Calcutta,  the  Judsons  and  Mr.  Rice  announced  their  change 
of  view  as  to  baptism  and  offered  themselves  to 
eavier        ^^  immersed  by  the  Baptist  missionaries  at  Cal- 
cutta who  had  welcomed  them  on  their  arrival  in 
India.     "What  the  Lord  means,"  wrote  Hall  and  Nott,  "by 
thus  dividing  us  in  sentiment  and  separating  us  from  each 
other,  we  cannot  tell."     Yet  from  this  apparent  disaster  came 
another    American    society,    the    Baptist    Missionary    Union, 
another  chain  of  missions  for  the  Christian  conquest  of  India, 
and,  in  particular,  the  opening  of  work  in  Burma,  the  very 
object  for  which  that  first  company  started  to  the  East  and 
from  which  the  others  had  been  turned  aside. 

A  still  heavier  sorrow  was  soon  to  be  borne.  The  Newells' 
voyage  to  Mauritius  was  long  and  full  of  peril  and  hardship. 
The  new-born  babe  died  at  sea;  the  mother  soon  after  arrival 
at  Port  Louis.  The  pathos  of  this  story,  the  figure  of  the 
stricken  man  left  to  his  lonely  battle  with  heathenism,  most  of 
all  perhaps  the  exquisite  character  and  lofty  faith  of  Harriet 
Newell,  as  revealed  in  the  record  of  her  short  life,  proved  a 
mighty  incentive  to  the  new  missionary  enterprise.  It  inspired 
her  associates  with  fresh  devotion  to  their  task  from  which  she 
had  been  taken,  and  it  thrilled  America.  Here,  also,  what 
seemed  a  crushing  loss  became  an  abiding  gain. 

Long  before  official  permission  was  given,  the  intrepid  men 
at  Bombay  had  gone  quietly  about  their  task.  Even  to  their 
faith  it  could  hardly  have  seemed  other  than  a 
-.  ®  -  colossal  venture.  At  last  they  were  face  to  face 
with  the  heathenism  that  had  oppressed  their 
imaginations  at  home.  The  island  city  to  which  they  were  shut 
in  was  one  of  its  strongholds.  And  when  thej^  looked  across 
the  narrow  straits  they  saw  there  a  land  as  yet  almost  untouched 
by  western  civilization.  A  score  or  more  miles  back  from  the 
coast  were  the  high  ranges  of  the  Western  Ghats,  running  north 
and  south;  between  them  and  the  sea  was  the  fertile  region 


20     STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

called  the  Konkan;  east  of  the  mountains  stretched  the  broad 
and  drier  tableland  of  the  Deccan.  In  this  territory,  extending 
three  hundred  miles  along  the  coast  and  some  four  hundred 
and  fifty  miles  inland,  with  a  population  of  about  11,000,000, 
far  more  than  the  United  States  could  then  boast,  dwelt  the 
Marathi  people,  one  of  the  strongest  races  of  India,  yet  in 
those  days  such  notorious  marauders  that  the  government  was 
compelled  to  interfere  and,  in  the  war  of  1817,  to  force  an  abso- 
lute surrender.  Among  such  a  people,  a  mixture  of  Moham- 
medans, fire-worshiping  Parsees,  and  idolatrous  Hindus,  the 
last  altogether  the  most  numerous,  came  these  two  men,  with- 
out knowledge  of  language  or  of  land,  with  no  experience  of 
missionary  labor,  the  messengers  of  a  society  which  had  yet 
no  standing  or  sure  support,  to  attempt  the  establishment 
of  the  kindgom  of  God. 

To  be  sure,  they  were  not  the  first  missionaries  to  the  penin- 
sula of  India.  The  legend  that  the  apostle  Thomas  planted 
Christianity  in  this  land  is  doubtless  to  be  discarded,  but  there 
is  clear  history  of  missionary  work  by  the  Syrian  Christians 
in  early  times  and  by  the  Roman  Catholics  in  later  centuries. 
In  the  modern  era  both  Anglo-Saxon  and  Continental  societies 
found  their  first  fields  in  India;  the  Danish  mission  located  at 
Tranquebar,  and  Carey  and  his  company  at  Calcutta  and 
Serampore.  But  for  the  work  of  evangelizing  the  Marathi 
people  not  one  step  had  yet  been  taken  when  the  nineteenth 
century  opened;  the  representatives  of  the  American  Board 
were  the  pioneers  in  a  great  wilderness,  without  map  or  path 
or  guide. 

Their  first  task  was  to  learn  the  language,  for  which  they 

had  neither  dictionary  nor  grammar;  but  in  whose  study  the 

English  wife  whom  Mr.  Hall  had  married  in  1813, 

Getting  ^^  ^^^  ^^g  familiar  with  the  Hindustani  speech 

Started  ,     ,  ^  ,         .  .  tix 

and  character,  was  of  great  assistance.     Moreover, 

it  was  the  habit  of  the  missionaries  to  take  their  daily  walk 
where  they  might  meet  the  people,  by  the  temples,  bazaars, 


STARTING   IN   INDIA  AND   CEYLON  21 

or  burning  ghats,  pausing  like  their  Master  of  old  wherever 
a  group  would  gather  around  to  listen.  Thus  they  soon 
began  to  make  acquaintance,  and  to  learn  the  hfe  and  habit 
of  the  people.  Their  journals  and  letters  home  described  with 
vivid  detail  scenes  that  woke  both  horror  and  pity :  the  debas- 
ing idolatry,  the  shameless  vice,  the  ignorance  and  supersti- 
tion of  the  lower  classes,  the  pride  of  the  Brahmans,  the  woe 
of  a  weary  land. 

At  once  they  were  face  to  face  with  what  was  to  prove  their 
bitterest  foe,  the  most  stubborn  obstacle  that  modern  missions 
The  have  had  to  meet,  India's  distinctive  social  custom, 

Obstacle  caste.  Of  ancient  origin,  an  organized  system  five 
of  Caste  centuries  before  the  Christian  era,  this  principle 
of  dividing  the  people  of  the  land  into  separate  groups  was  now 
fundamental  to  Indian  society.  Its  law  was  absolute,  rigorous, 
and  unflinching,  forbidding  all  marriage,  breaking  of  bread, 
physical  contact,  or  even  pursuit  of  an  occupation  outside  the 
boundaries  of  the  individual's  caste.  Punishing  all  violations 
of  its  rules  by  the  severest  penalties,  such  as  boycott  and  social 
ostracism,  this  tyrannous  system  had  become  the  curse  of 
India,  destroying  both  national  spirit  and  individual  ambition, 
promoting  pride  and  strife,  crushing  out  human  sympathies, 
binding  life  in  its  every  action,  and  blocking  every  door  of 
progress.  The  missionaries,  seeing  the  misery  of  it,  from  the 
first  made  abandonment  of  caste  a  test  of  Christian  discipleship. 
They  have  ever  done  their  utmost  to  stamp  it  out  of  the  Chris- 
tian Church  and  community;  but  it  remains  a  persistent  and 
wily  foe. 

As  soon  as  a  little  knowledge  of  the  language  had  been 
gained,  parts  of  the  New  Testament  were  translated,  and 
The  Press  with  a  press  from  Calcutta  and  a  printer  gained  by 
and  the  the  transfer  of  a  new  missionary  from  Ceylon,  por- 
School  tions  of  the  Scriptures  were  printed  and  scattered 

wherever  opportunity  was  found. 

At  the  same  time  free  day  schools  using  the  vernacular  were 


22  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN   BOARD 

started,  which  at  first  were  of  necessity  taught  by  Brahmans. 
For  this  reason  parents  were  less  afraid  to  send  their  children 
to  the  mission  schools,  while  the  missionaries  took  care  to 
inject  a  plentiful  amount  of  Christian  teaching  into  the  day's 
routine.  So  rapidly  did  these  schools  multiply  that  fond 
hopes  were  awakened  in  America  that  Hinduism  was  fast 
being  undermined.  Within  three  or  four  years  twenty-five 
such  schools  were  in  operation,  with  some  1,200  pupils,  at  a 
cost  of  only  $11  a  month  for  100  boys.^ 

While  a  beginning  was  thus  made  in  Bombay  the  American 
Board  was  opening  a  second  mission  in  Ceylon.  The  start 
Beginning  there  was  for  many  reasons  easier  than  in  West 
in  Ceylon,  India.  Newell,  who  had  stopped  at  Ceylon  on  his 
i8i6  ^ay  from  Mauritius  to  join  Hall,  had  learned  that 

the  governor  desired  missionaries  and  that  the  people  seemed 
not  unfriendly  to  Christianity.  The  war  with  England  now 
being  over,  the  Board  therefore  followed  what  seemed  a  provi- 
dential leading  in  designating  its  new  appointees,  who  had  been 
waiting  for  an  open  door,  to  this  island  so  closely  associated 
with  India.  Five  missionaries,  whose  names  were  to  become 
historic,  Messrs.  Warren,  Richards,  Meigs,  Bardwell,  and  Poor, 
all  married  men  except  Mr.  Warren,  arrived  in  March,  1816, 
and  chose  Jaffna  as  their  first  location. 

This  comparatively  small  island,  or  rather  peninsula  of 
Jaffna,  connected  with  the  main  island  by  a  sand-bank  forty 
miles  wide,  was  occupied  by  a  Tamil-speaking  population  of 
350,000,  whose  ancestors  had  come  over  from  South  India, 
and  were  unlike  in  race,  speech,  and  religion  to  most  of  the 
Ceylonese.  Here  the  missionaries  were  able  to  enter  into  a 
work  that  had  been  begun  by  the  Portuguese,  passed  over  to 
the  Dutch,  and  now,  with  the  transfer  of  the  island  to  the 
English  in  1802,  was  open  to  new  laborers.  To  the  glebes 
and  buildings  thus  abandoned  by  the  Dutch  the  American 
missionaries  succeeded.  Large  buildings  of  coral  stone,  amply 
*  The  narrative  of  this  mission  is  resumed  on  page  24. 


STARTING   IN   INDIA  AND   CEYLON  23 

sufficient  both  for  public  worship  and  for  schools,  residences 
for  the  missionaries,  and  gardens  with  fruit-trees,  were  at  once 
at  the  disposal  of  this  mission.  Moreover,  as  a  good  transla- 
tion of  the  Scriptures  in  the  Tamil  language  had  been  in  exist- 
ence for  years,  there  was  less  need  of  a  printing  press  than  at 
Bombay,  whither  Mr.  Bardwell  was  accordingly  despatched. 

Beyond  these  outward  aids  the  Americans  inherited  httle 
from  the  previous  workers.  The  Dutch  had  made  Christianity 
compulsory,  driving  the  people  to  church ;  the  English  on  taking 
possession  abandoned  all  religious  effort.  The  so-called  con- 
verts apostatized  and  the  American  missionaries  found  Chris- 
tianity disgraced  in  the  eyes  of  the  natives.  The  religion  of 
this  people,  like  that  of  the  Tamils  on  the  mainland,  was  a 
composite  of  the  Hinduism  and  the  devil-worship  of  the  Dra- 
vidian  progenitors  who  had  migrated  into  southern  India. 
The  result  was  a  gross  and  multitudinous  idolatry.  Temples 
abounded  with  their  demoralizing  ritual.  Religious  festivals 
were  seasons  of  puerile  and  corrupting  practises,  beginning 
with  bathing  and  dressing  the  idols,  and  ending  with  a  rough 
brawl  over  the  distribution  of  cocoanuts  for  the  feast. 

Here,  as  in  Bombay,  the  schools  were  the  most  effective 
agency  for  getting  hold  of  the  people.  Parents  were  quite 
ready  to  put  their  children  under  the  care  of  mis- 
Sd^ool?  sionaries,  provided  they  would  support  them.  A 
boarding-school  was  soon  started,  in  which  boys 
were  taken  out  of  their  old  associations  and  subjected  to  a 
rigorous  mental  and  spiritual  discipline.  For  a  time  it  was 
the  peculiar  habit  in  this  mission  to  assign  to  these  boys  the 
names  of  the  patrons  in  America  who  furnished  their  support. 

With  the  work  of  teaching  went  that  of  preaching.  The 
year  after  their  arrival  both  Mr.  Poor  and  Mr.  Meigs  were 
preaching  in  the  native  tongue,  surpassing  in  this  respect  the 
record  of  Hall  and  Newell  in  Bombay,  who  began  to  preach 
before  the  close  of  their  second  year.  In  1820  reenforcements 
came,  including  Levi  Spaulding  and  Miron  Winslow,  whose 


24     STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

long  careers  in  Ceylon  were  to  be  among  the  formative  influ- 
ences of  the  mission  there.  The  coming  of  these  men  was 
opportune  for  this  among  other  reasons,  that  the  new  English 
governor  of  the  island  absolutely  forbade  any  further  increase 
of  the  mission,  ordering  back  the  next  to  arrive,  and  telling 
the  missionaries  frankly  that  he  thought  the  English  were  able 
to  take  care  of  their  own  island  and  its  natives;  that  America 
had  enough  to  do  for  the  Indians  of  that  country;  the  mission- 
aries of  the  Enghsh  Church  could  be  relied  on  to  provide  all 
the  missionary  work  that  Ceylon  needed.^ 

Having  at  length  authorized  the  presence  of  missionaries  in 
India,  the  British  government  gave  them  full  protection, 
Advance  ^^^  ^s  reenforcements  came  to  the  mission  it  was 
in  Bombay  possible  to  reach  points  outside  of  Bombay.  By 
(See  p.  22)  preaching  tours  along  the  coast  the  field  was  now 
extended  and  some  schools  were  started.  Yet  it  was  slow  work 
and  disappointing  in  many  ways.  After  five  years  there  were  no 
converts,  and  when  the  first  appeared  he  was  a  Mohammedan 
from  Hyderabad,  who  while  on  a  visit  to  Bombay  read  a  Chris- 
tian tract,  was  won  by  it,  attached  himself  to  the  missionaries, 
and  afterward  made  several  evangelistic  tours  on  the  mainland. 

The  first  chapel  for  public  worship  in  Bombay  was  erected 
in  1822.  After  his  experiences  in  attempting  to  preach  out  of 
doors  and  in  private  houses,  it  was  with  great  joy  that  Hall 
could  gather  a  congregation  in  a  place  appointed  for  the  pur- 
pose. The  building  was  small  and  unpretentious,  with  the 
earth  for  a  floor;  its  upper  story  was  used  for  a  chapel,  while 
the  lower  was  devoted  to  the  press,  the  verandas  being  used 
for  a  school.  Yet  it  was  not  without  honor  as  the  first  of  the 
many  houses  of  worship  which  the  American  Board  was  to  erect. 

At  the  end  of  ten  years'  labor  there  was  not  much  to  report 

in  figures,  yet  the  missionaries  rejoiced  to  feel  that  some  real 

and  wide  impression  had  been  made  in  this  hard  field,  especially 

through  the  schools  and  the  printed  page.     At  least,  the  tools 

*  The  narrative  of  this  mission  is  resumed  on  page  26. 


STARTING  IN  INDIA  AND  CEYLON  25 

and  the  workshop  were  ready,  and  there  was  good-will  among 
the  workers.  The  comradeship  which  from  the  first  had  been 
evidenced  by  the  missionaries  of  various  societies  in  Bombay 
appeared  in  the  formation  in  1825  of  the  Bombay  Missionary 
Union,  in  which  the  representatives  of  the  American  Board 
joined  those  of  English  and  Scottish  societies. 

From  the  outset  the  American  missionaries  were  eager  to 
touch  the  mainland,  but  the  government  was  fearful  that  this 
Advance  step  would  bring  disorder.  Schools,  however,  were 
on  the  begun  and  steadily  increased  on  the  continent   as 

Mainland  ^^ell  as  on  the  island.  In  some  of  these  schools 
Jewish  teachers  were  employed  rather  than  Brahman,  and  so 
some  Jewish  scholars  were  attracted,  until  distinctive  schools 
for  this  race  were  established  both  for  boys  and  girls.  This 
first  work  for  girls  and  women  in  India  called  forth  the  appre- 
ciation of  the  governor  of  Bombay  and  other  English  friends. 

Long  before  stations  could  be  attempted  outside  of  Bombay 
the  missionaries  were  touring  far  inland,  prospecting  the  field 
that  should  yet  open.  In  this  journeying  Hall  was  the  leader. 
Going  alone  but  for  his  native  attendants,  he  ventured  far, 
getting  close  to  the  people,  studying  their  life,  conversing  with 
whomever  he  might  meet,  a  watchful  visitor  at  rehgious  fes- 
tivals, marriage  celebrations,  the  exorcising  of  the  sick,  the 
ritual  of  the  temples.  So  the  abominations  of  popular  Hin- 
duism, the  fetishism  and  fakirism,  the  sensuality,  cruelty,  and 
groveling  idolatry,  were  burned  into  his  soul.  He  learned  of 
the  Sati,  the  immolation  of  the  widow,  of  the  hook  swinging 
and  the  temple  car,  and  of  other  inhuman  practises,  now  largely 
abolished,  but  then  tolerated  in  the  land.  It  was  as  he  turned 
his  face  homeward  from  one  of  these  tours,  after  encountering 
an  outbreak  of  cholera  and  dispensing  to  the  people  of  the 
village  all  the  medicines  he  had,  that  Hall  found  himself  stricken 
with  the  dread  disease.  As  he  fell  to  the  ground  by  the  temple 
on  whose  veranda  he  had  spent  the  night,  helpless  and  knowing 
well  that  he  could  not  recover,  he  gave  directions  to  his  attend- 


26     STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

ants,  exhorted  them  to  forsake  their  idols,  prayed  fervently  for 
his  wife  and  children,  his  missionary  brethren  and  the  multitudes 
around  him,  and  quietly  gave  up  his  spirit  to  God.  Thus  passed 
from  earth  that  superb  missionary,  Gordon  Hall,  pioneer  in 
the  first  mission  of  the  Board,  who  gave  tone  and  power  to 
all  its  undertaking,  not  alone  in  India,  but  on  every  field. 

Hall's  untimely  death  was  one  of  many.  In  quick  succession 
during  these  years  of  beginnings  the  missionaries  fell  at  their 

posts  or  were  compelled  to  withdraw,  broken  down 
j^^^  by  the  strain.     Reenforcements  did  not  keep  pace 

with  the  deaths;  in  1826  the  mission  at  Bombay 
was  reduced  again  to  two  members,  and  after  that  there  were 
seldom  more  than  two  in  the  city  at  any  one  time  who  could 
converse  with  the  people.  During  the  first  twenty  years  of 
work  among  the  Marathi  people  more  missionaries  died  than 
natives  were  baptized.  The  average  missionary  life  was  about 
five  years  and  three  months,  or,  counting  active  service  after 
the  language  had  been  learned,  not  more  than  three  and  a 
quarter  years.  The  record  for  this  whole  period  in  the  four 
missions  which  were  in  operation  by  1850  is  well-nigh  unbeliev- 
able. On  the  highlands  of  Ahmednagar  as  well  as  at  Bombay 
the  missionaries  were  continually  failing  in  health,  or  through 
ignorance  of  preventive  measures  falling  victims  to  the  ever- 
prevalent  cholera.  In  Ceylon  the  death-rate  was  even  greater. 
Often  the  reenforcements  could  not  come  fast  enough  to  fill 
the  places  of  those  who  fell  by  the  way.  The  laying  of  founda- 
tions was  ever  costly.^ 

While  the  little  company  at  Bombay  were  trying  to  pene- 
trate their  broad  territory,  in  the  more  compact  and  freer 
Educa-  ^^^^  ^^  Jaffna  the  missionaries  had  developed  five 
tional  stations.     Here,   too,   the   school  was   at   first   the 

Work  in  most  serviceable  agency,  and  until  a  generation  of 
Ceylon  Christian  teachers  could  be  trained  Brahman  mas- 

(See  p.  24)    ^^^^  ^^^.^  employed.     The  village  schools  were  held 
1  The  narrative  of  this  mission  is  resumed  on  page  29. 


STARTING  IN   INDIA  AND   CEYLON  27 

in  open  bungalows,  the  boys  seated  on  mats  around  the  sides 
of  the  room,  marking  in  the  sand  or  conning  their  lessons, 
written  on  palm  leaves,  all  studying  aloud  and  learning  by 
rote  with  little  concern  for  the  sense.  Gradually  native  books 
were  supplanted  by  Christian  publications.  Once  a  week  the 
missionaries  examined  the  scholars  and  conferred  with  the 
teachers,  to  counterbalance  somewhat  the  baleful  influence  of 
pagan  instructors. 

Boarding-schools  for  boys  and  girls,  which  in  the  early  days 
served  as  normal  schools,  increased  in  number,  until  in  1823 
there  was  one  at  almost  every  station.  It  was  not  difficult  to 
secure  students.  Boys  were  plentiful,  and  if  at  first  parents 
were  unwilling  to  let  their  daughters  learn  to  read,  by  1824 
there  were  nearly  250  girls  in  the  schools. 

The  regimen  of  these  boarding-schools  was  stiff,  the  day's 
routine  beginning  at  six  in  the  morning,  when  the  bell  rang  for 
A  Board-  prayers.  The  Sabbaths  were  scarcely  less  strenuous 
ing-School  than  the  week  days,  with  attendance  on  various 
Day  in  services,   the   reciting   of   Scripture   and   catechism 

Jafifna  memorized  during  the  week,  occasional  meetings  of 

inquiry  and  assembHes  where  the  pupils  listened  to  "remarks 
calculated  to  make  serious  impressions,"  besides  regular  relig- 
ious meetings  among  themselves.  The  indefatigable  mission- 
aries were  gratified  by  the  results  of  this  training.  But  in  view  of 
the  natural  indolence  of  the  people,  the  show  and  stir  of  religion 
in  their  temples,  and  the  easy-going  character  of  previous 
mission  work  in  Jaffna,  it  is  not  strange  that  the  Americans 
did  not  at  once  win  all  the  people  to  the  new  faith. 

So  successful  were  the  Ceylon  schools  and  so  urgent  the 
need  of  trained  native  teachers  that  at  length  a  seminary  was 
Higher  established  at  Batticotta,  some  English  residents 
Education,  being  among  its  first  benefactors,  like  Sir  Richard 
1826  Ottley,    whose    name    is    commemorated    by    its 

principal  building,  Ottley  Hall.  The  missionaries  were  the 
first  teachers,  though  it  was  expected  that  the  school  would 


28     STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

gradually  develop  its  own  instructors.  That  it  met  a  want 
appears  in  the  fact  that  two  years  after  its  establishment 
there  were  not  less  than  200  applicants  for  admission  when 
only  twenty -nine  could  be  received. 

At  the  same  time  a  seminar}^  for  girls  was  established  at 
Oodooville,  its  purpose  being  as  frankly  stated  'Ho  provide 
suitable  companions  for  the  graduates  of  the  seininary  at 
Batticotta."  The  significance  of  this  school  for  girls  is 
seen  when  one  considers  that  in  1816  there  were  only  three 
respectable  women  of  Jaffna  who  were  known  to  be  able  to 
read  and  write,  as  only  dancing  girls  in  the  temples  were  given 
any  sort  of  education.  At  first  the  pupils  of  this  new  school 
were  practically  adopted  by  the  mission.  They  were  taken 
between  six  and  ten  years  of  age,  from  different  castes,  and 
kept  in  school  until  their  marriage,  being  housed,  clothed,  and 
fed  by  the  mission;  if  married  with  its  approval,  they  received 
a  dowry  of  $25. 

All  through  this  period  mission  effort  in  Ceylon  was  marked 
by  frequent  revivals.  The  first  of  the  series  came  in  1821  at 
A  Succes-  Tillipally.  The  most  notal)le  of  all  was  in  1830, 
sion  of  when  the  work  of  the  seminary  at  Batticotta  was 
Revivals  practically  suspended  for  a  time,  while  by  day  and 
night  there  was  continuous  prayer  and  confession.  These 
religious  awakenings  appeared  most  markedly  in  the  schools; 
in  some  cases  nearly  all  the  pupils  acknowledged  themselves 
disciples  of  Christ.  Not  all  the  converts,  however,  were 
young  people;  among  the  number  were  thirty  native  school- 
masters. 

The  weakness  and  indifference  of  native  character  were  a 
constant  source  of  anxiety  to  the  missionaries,  and  disappoint- 
ments were  often  heavy.  So  late  as  1843  there  was  disclosed 
in  Batticotta  Seminary  a  wretched  relapse  into  heathen  prac- 
tises, which  almost  emptied  the  school  and  required  prompt 
and  severe  discipline.  Yet  from  the  early  days  there  were 
individual  cases  of  unmistakably  changed  lives,  and  enough 


STARTING  IN  INDIA  AND  CEYLON  29 

of  them  always  to  keep  heart  of  hope.  Such  were  the  first 
three  native  preachers  ordained  in  1821,  of  whom  the  most 
distinguished  was  Gabriel  Tissera,  the  first  convert  received 
into  the  church,  a  man  of  superior  talents,  with  an  ardent 
thirst  for  knowledge,  who  became  one  of  the  trusted  teachers 
at  Batticotta,  and  whose  influence  as  teacher,  preacher,  and 
leader  in  all  departments  of  mission  life  was  one  of  the  strong 
forces  of  the  early  years.  His  letter  to  Secretary  Anderson 
and  his  private  journal,  both  of  which  were  beautifully  written 
and  rich  in  information  and  suggestion,  made  a  profound 
impression  when  printed  in  America. 

Others  there  were,  no  less  genuine  if  less  conspicuous 
witnesses  to  the  power  of  the  gospel  on  their  lives;  like  that 
native  Christian  who,  happening  near  a  temple  well  as  one 
of  the  worshipers  was  struggling  in  the  water,  with  a  crowd 
including  temple  priests  looking  idly  on,  leaped  into  the  well 
and  saved  the  man,  thereby  silencing  some  of  those  who  had 
been  declaiming  against  Christianit3^^ 

The  death  of  Gordon  Hall  shocked  but  did  not  paralyze 
the  mission  at  Bombay.  Work  went  on;  converts  began  to 
Ahmedna-  appear;  the  press  was  active,  schools  popular  and 
gar,  1831  crowded.  A  start  had  been  made;  it  was  a  time 
(See  p.  26)  to  move  forward.  After  careful  tours  of  exploration 
Ahmednagar  was  selected  as  the  best  site  for  a  station  on  the 
mainland.  Situated  on  the  high  tableland  of  the  Deccan, 
150  miles  east  of  Bombay,  a  seat  of  Moslem  rule  in  the  time 
of  the  Mogul  emperors,  now  a  miUtary  station  of  the  gov- 
ernment, it  was  still  a  city  of  importance  in  the  wide  dis- 
trict with  its  500,000  inhabitants.  Work  was  begun  in  the 
same  fashion  as  at  Bombay,  except  tlfat  the  missionaries 
were  now  better  equipped  and  had  the  aid  of  some  native 
helpers,  like  the  Brahman,  Babajee,  the  first  to  unite  with 
the  Bombay  church  and  a  valued  teacher.  Persecution  was 
experienced  at  first,  missionaries  being  hooted  and  pelted  with 
1  The  narrative  of  this  mission  is  resumed  on  page  32, 


30     STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

dirt  in  the  streets  of  the  city.  But  they  slowly  won  their  way, 
the  schools  here  as  elsewhere  proving  an  attraction  and  win- 
ning confidence.  From  this  new  center  systematic  tours  were 
made  through  the  entire  region,  with  the  valued  aid  of  native 
Christians.  Though  these  tours  were  openly  itineracies  for 
preaching  and  distributing  the  printed  message,  no  harm  was 
suffered  among  a  people  but  a  little  while  before  regarded  as 
turbulent  plunderers. 

In  the  field  of  the  Deccan  the  mission  came  in  contact  with 
the  Mahars  and  Mangs,  two  of  the  outcastes,  the  latter  classed 
as  hereditary  beggars  and  thieves;  but  here  the  representatives 
of  these  castes  were  of  higher  grade  than  in  Bombay.  Next 
to  the  Brahmans  the  Mangs  furnish  the  Hindus  most  of  their 
gurus,  or  religious  teachers,  and  the  Mang  converts  brought 
to  Christianity  some  of  the  best  native  workers.  The  recep- 
tion of  these  people  into  the  Christian  community  stirred 
again  the  caste  spirit  and  provoked  quarrels  in  the  Ahmednagar 
church  which  the  missionaries  met  with  firm  measures.  Perse- 
cution of  Brahman  converts  was  bitter,  parents  wailing  over  a 
son  who  had  become  a  Christian  as  if  he  were  dead. 

The  charter  of  1833  opened  India  everywhere  to  the  free 

occupancy  of  the  missionary.     With  the  coming  of  substantial 

reenforcements  to   Ceylon  a  new  mission  on  the 

J.         '       mainland  was  begun  by  Messrs.  Spaulding  and  Poor 

in    the    Madura    CoUectorate,    a    Tamil-speaking 

region  across  the  strait  from  Jaffna.     The  city  of  Madura  was 

first  occupied,  a  principal  seat  of  idolatry  in  South  India,  and 

the  ancient  and  proud  capital  of  a  vast  agricultural  territory. 

Here,   as  in  West  India,   the  great  majority  of   the  people 

were  caste  and  outcaste  Hindus,  with  a  considerable  number 

of  Brahmans  and  Mohammedans.     And  here  again  schools 

were    an    immediate    and    sure    agency    for    attracting    the 

people.     Within  a  year,  in  thirty-five  schools  were  gathered 

more   than  1000   boys  and  nearly  900   girls.     Soon  a  more 

advanced  school  was  opened  in  Madura  city.     Native  help- 


STARTING   IN   INDIA  AND  CEYLON  31 

ers  were  brought  from  various  missions,  eight  from  Batti- 
cotta.  At  first  the  schools  suffered  somewhat  from  reports 
that  the  missionaries  compelled  the  scholars  to  swallow  a  dose 
prepared  to  bewilder  their  minds  in  order  to  make  Christians 
of  them.  Other  rumors  declared  that  it  was  planned  to  make 
slaves  or  soldiers  of  the  children  or  to  transport  them  to  a 
foreign  country.  But  soon  these  delusions  were  dispelled. 
By  1835  there  were  three  other  stations  in  the  mission,  and  at 
length,  by  the  close  of  this  period,  a  chain  of  stations  covered 
the  province,  with  many  Christian  congregations  and  com- 
munities, village  schools,  and  a  substantial  seminary  at  Pasu- 
malai.  That  the  Board  was  able  thus  promptly  and  easily 
to  launch  a  mission  in  the  Madras  presidency  was  due  in 
large  measure  to  the  skill  and  tact  of  its  first  representatives 
there.  To  be  sure,  the  new  charter  gave  them  legal  footing. 
But  officials  might  easily  and  naturally  have  hindered  the 
introduction  of  a  new  sect  among  the  warring  religions  in  this 
region  beyond  the  governor's  oversight.  The  sagacious  mis- 
sionaries emphasized  the  value  of  their  schools  and  the  benefits 
they  had  brought  to  the  people  of  Jaffna  until  the  government 
felt  there  was  nothing  fanatical  or  dangerous  in  their  plans, 
and  they  were  warmly  welcomed  by  collector  and  district 
judge.  The  battle  was  thus  won  before  it  was  joined,  and 
from  that  day  the  Madura  Mission  has  enjoyed  the  good-will 
of  local  rulers  and  the  people  of  the  region  as  well  as  of  the 
Madras  government. 

A  mission  was  also  opened  in  Madras  in  1836,  with  the 
coming  of  Miron  Winslow  and  Dr.  John  Scudder  by  another 
,     ,  transfer  from  Ceylon.     The  primary  purpose  was 

i8^6  '  ^°  ^^^  ^  ^^^  location  for  a  publishing  house  for  the 
Tamil-speaking  people.  Both  the  Church  Mission- 
ary Society  and  the  London  Missionary  Society,  already  on  the 
ground,  approved  the  enterprise,  and  the  work  undertaken 
was  to  some  extent  cooperative.  A  large  printing  press,  with 
Phineas  Hunt  as  printer,  was  secured  in  1838,  and  a  stream  of 


32  STORY  OF  THE  AIMERICAN  BOARD 

publications,  books,  Scripture  portions,  magazines,  and  tracts 
began  to  appear.  Though  j\Ir.  Winslow's  time  was  largely 
occupied  in  the  revision  of  the  Tamil  Scriptures,  a  work  of 
wide  use  and  influence  published  in  1850,  yet  both  missionaries 
were  able  to  undertake  tours  in  various  directions,  even  extend- 
ing into  Tanjore  and  Mysore.  The  hardships  and  dangers 
incurred  on  these  trips  show  the  stuff  of  which  missionaries  are 
made.  The  story  of  Mrs.  Scudder,  hastening  to  the  help  of 
her  husband,  who  had  fallen  sick  unto  death  with  jungle  fever 
on  one  of  his  tours,  and  spending  a  night  alone  with  her  little 
son  in  the  worst  part  of  a  jungle  road,  her  carriers  having  fled 
frightened  by  the  somids  of  ^^ild  beasts,  reveals  the  heroism 
of  the  women  as  well  as  of  the  men. 

Here,  as  elsewhere,  the  missionaries  encountered  opposition; 
the  more  impression  they  made,  the  greater  the  antagonism. 
On  one  occasion  8000  people  met  to  devise  means  to  prevent 
the  spread  of  Christianity.  It  appeared  that  the  Hindu, 
"though  mild  and  timid,  is  yet  exceedingly  stubborn,  and 
when  excited,  rabid."  Some  of  the  converts  were  frightened 
away,  yet  steady  gains  were  made. 

It  was  a  sorry  coincidence  that  just  as  the  young  missions 
in  India  were  being  enlarged  and  the  outlook  seemed  bright 
Hard  ^or  advance,  there  should  have  fallen  upon  America 

Times  the  great   business  depression  of   1837.     Its  effect 

(See  p.  29)  was  disastrous  in  the  mission  field,  particularly  in 
Ceylon,  where  171  free  schools  had  to  be  closed.  Over  5000 
pupils  were  thus  suddenly  dismissed,  to  the  grief  of  the  mis- 
sionaries who  had  toiled  hard  to  \^in  them.  The  boarding- 
schools  at  Batticotta  and  Oodooville  were  kept  from  closing 
only  by  a  timely  donation  from  the  Ceylon  government.  The 
heathen  exulted  over  the  supposed  collapse  of  the  mission; 
native  converts  were  discouraged  and  scattered;  confidence  was 
lost,  and  the  work  crippled  for  long,  if  not  permanently 
retarded.  The  only  bright  feature  of  the  disaster  was  the 
noble  beha\Hor  of  some  of  the  native  teachers  in  the  schools. 


STARTING   IN   INDIA   AND   CEYLON  33 

who  voluntarily  kept  to  their  task,  though  their  small  stipend 
was  greatly  reduced. 

The  missions  on  the  continent  were  embarra.ssed  in  like 
manner,  though,  owing  to  the  liberal  aid  of  foreign  residents 
and  of  the  government,  not  to  the  same  extent.  So  the  work 
was  kept  from  disintegration  until  the  churches  in  America 
ralhed  again  to  its  support. 

The  young  missions  were  further  burdened  by  various  catas- 
trophes affecting  them  or  the  people  around  them.  Fire, 
famine,  and  plague  were  recurring  distresses.  When  cholera 
broke  out  in  Jaffna  in  1846  most  of  the  Christians  escaped,  but 
some  were  stricken;  there  was  general  panic;  school  work  and 
all  mission  appointments  were  interrupted,  the  time  and  strength 
of  the  missionaries  being  devoted  to  ministering  to  the  sick  and 
afflicted. 

Not'VN'ithstanding  all  these  difficulties  and  distresses,  it  was 

impressive  to  see  how  the  missions  continued  to  grow  and 

even  to  thrive.     Evidently  they  had  \s'ithin  them 

°w^  A  ^^^  mystery  of  life,  with  all  its  recuperative  powers. 
As  the  missionaries  looked  back  after  the  first  gen- 
eration to  see  what  had  been  gained,  their  hearts  were  full  of 
thanksgi^-ing.  In  spite  of  obstacles,  inexperience,  and  mis- 
takes, as  they  had  sought  to  follow  the  leading  of  God,  they 
had  already  been  enabled  to  accomplish  what  to  human  eyes 
seemed  impossible. 

Everj-where  the  schools  were  recognized  as  agencies  of  prime 
importance.  They  were  not  all  equally  strong;  not  so  well 
maintained  in  Ahmednagar  as  in  Bombay,  where  in  particular 
Mrs.  Hume's  boarding-school  for  girls  was  an  influence  of 
first  magnitude.  The  Ceylon  missionaries  were  often  anxious 
about  the  character  of  their  scholars,  wondering  whether  these 
''exotics"  would  be  able  to  ''endure  the  deadly  blasts."  At 
Madura,  when  in  1847  the  missionaries  set  themselves  to  stamp 
out  the  caste  spirit  between  Sudras  and  Pariahs  in  church 
and  school,  and  apphed  strict  tests,  Pastmialai  Seminary  was 


34     STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

nearly  stripped  of  its  teachers  as  well  as  scholars,  the  very  life 
of  both  church  and  school  being  for  some  time  threatened. 

At  best,  in  all  these  missions  the  growth  of  the  churches 
hardly  kept  pace  with  that  of  the  schools.  Few  churches  were 
able  or  disposed  to  bear  much  responsibility,  and  there  were 
almost  no  native  preachers.  The  beginnings  of  liberal  gifts 
were  found  in  some  places,  especially  in  native  Bible  societies 
in  Ceylon,  whose  members  subscribed  for  the  spread  of  the 
Word  of  God. 

The  press  stood  beside  the  school  in  those  days.  The 
printing  establishment  in  Bombay  was  one  of  the  largest 
in  all  India,  and  at  the  height  of  its  activity  employed  more 
than  100  workmen.  The  product  of  the  press  here  and  in 
Madras  and  Jaffna  also  was,  in  amount  and  influence, 
almost  beyond  belief.  By  1850  Miron  Winslow  and  his  asso- 
ciates had  finished  the  translation  of  the  entire  Bible  into 
Tamil,  and  it  had  been  published  in  Madras.  Soon  after,  the 
Marathi  Bible  appeared  in  Bombay.  Besides  the  Scriptures, 
text-books,  religious  and  secular,  dictionaries,  hymn-books, 
tracts,  papers,  and  magazines  were  being  furnished  to  the 
growing  communities  able  to  read. 

But  the  most  conspicuous  evidence  of  the  progress  of  these 
missions  during  this  period  is  found  in  the  place  which  they 
had  attained.  Herein  the  passing  of  a  generation  marked  an 
immense  change.  Confidence  both  of  officials  and  natives  had 
been  secured  and  one  barrier  after  another  in  the  way  of 
Christian  toleration  had  been  removed.  The  schools  and  the 
new  knowledge  taught  in  them  had  won  the  interest  and  respect 
of  haughty  Brahmans,  so  that  other  than  low-caste  men  were 
now  being  approached.  And  when  in  1850  the  council  of 
the  governor-general  of  India  passed  an  act  giving  protection 
to  Christians  and  equal  rights  to  all  religions  throughout  the 
empire,  it  was  recognized  that  the  case  was  won.  Missions 
were  fairly  planted  in  the  land  where  a  generation  before  both 
natives  and  Europeans  had  sought  to  cast  them  out. 


Chapter  III 

FOLLOWING  INDIAN  TRAILS 

When  in  1820  the  lieutenant-governor  of  Ceylon  advised 
the  American  missionaries  to  turn  their  attention  rather  to 

the   Indians   of   their   own   country   he   was   quite 
"^  behind  the  times.     From  the  beginning  it  had  been 

the  purpose  of  Christian  settlers  in  the  New  World 
to  do  something  for  the  aborigines.  Upon  the  colonial  seal 
of  Massachusetts,  under  the  motto,  "Come  over  and  help  us," 
was  the  figure  of  an  Indian  looking  toward  a  star,  the  reminder 
of  Bethlehem's  gift  to  the  world.  And  from  the  days  of  the 
Pilgrim  Fathers,  answering  that  imagined  appeal,  had  appeared 
such  men  as  May  hew  and  Eliot,  as  John  Sergeant,  President 
Edwards  and  David  Brainerd,  as  Eleazar  Wheelock  with  his 
Indian  school,  and  Samson  Occam,  his  distinguished  pupil, 
representatives  of  a  gifted  and  devoted  company  of  men  who 
amid  the  struggle  and  excitement  of  founding  this  nation 
labored  to  make  the  approach  of  its  civilization  a  blessing  and 
not  a  curse  to  the  red  man. 

From  its  very  organization  the  American  Board  had  the 
Indians  in  its  thought.  Its  first  address  to  the  Christian  pubUc 
The  Pur-  in  November,  1811,  declared  the  intention  to  estab- 
pose  of  the  fish  a  mission  in  the  East  in  the  Burman  empire 
Board  and  in  the  West  among  the  Caghnawaga  (Iroquois) 

tribe  of  Indians.  By  1815  more  definite  plans  could  be 
announced.  The  Indians  in  the  United  States  were  then  esti- 
mated at  240,000,  about  100,000  of  them  hving  east  of  the 
Mississippi;  of  these,  the  four  southern  tribes,  Cherokees, 
Choctaws,  Chickasaws,  and  Creeks,  made  up  about  70,000. 

35 


36  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

After  tours  of  exploration,  in  which  Samuel  J.  Mills,  William 
Goodell,  and  Cyrus  Kingsbury  were  engaged,  in  accordance 
with  their  judgment  and  encouraged  by  the  success  of  a  Pres- 
byterian missionary  among  the  Cherokees  so  early  as  1804, 
the  Board  decided  that  these  southern  tribes  of  Indians  offered 
the  most  promising  material  upon  which  to  begin  work. 

In  January,  1817,  Rev.  Cyrus  Kingsbury  arrived  at  the 
first  location  among  the  Cherokees,  on  the  southern  border 
Cherokee  ^^  Tennessee,  close  to  the  Georgia  hne,  the  region 
Mission  of  Chattanooga,  afterward  to  be  made  famous  by 
Opened,  memorable  battles  of  the  Civil  War,  one  of  which 
1817  swept  across  Mission  Ridge.     In  memory  of  earlier 

efforts  for  the  red  men  the  missionaries  named  their  first  station 
Brainerd.  The  plan  of  operation  was  definitely  announced: 
to  establish  schools  in  different  parts  of  the  tribe  under  mis- 
sionary direction  and  superintendence;  to  teach  common- 
school  learning  and  the  useful  arts  of  life  and  Christianity;  so 
gradually  to  make  the  whole  tribe  English  in  language,  civilized 
in  habits,  and  Christian  in  religion. 

The  United  States  government  gave  its  cordial  approval  to 
the  undertaking.  By  order  of  President  Madison  the  Secre- 
tary of  War  promised  definite  aid  to  the  enterprise,  such  as 
needed  buildings,  tools  for  the  farm,  and  spinning-wheels  and 
looms  for  the  girls'  school.  But  upon  the  arrival  of  Mr.  Kings- 
bury and  the  associates  who  soon  followed  him,  it  appeared 
that  no  buildings  had  been  erected,  and  the  missionaries  were 
compelled  to  hew  the  logs  and  build  the  cabins  in  which  they 
were  both  to  live  and  to  work. 

Schools  were  begun  at  once,  made  up  both  of  full-blooded 
Cherokees  and  half-breeds,  with  Sabbath-schools  for  the  black 
people.  Twenty-six  were  almost  immediately  enrolled  as 
pupils.  The  schools  were  organized  after  the  Lancastrian 
pattern,  a  method  devised  by  an  English  scholar,  Joseph  Lan- 
caster, in  which  the  older  or  more  advanced  students  served 
as  monitors  and  taught  the  younger,  thus  reducing  the  number 


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FOLLOWING  INDIAN  TRAILS  37 

of  foreign  teachers  and  making  possible  a  larger  number  of 
scholars. 

The  routine  of  life  was  strenuous  here,  as  in  Ceylon,  and  as 
the  missionaries'  purpose  was  to  train  hand  as  well  as  head,  the 
recreation  of  their  pupils  was  provided  for  mainly 
R   ult  ^^  ^  ^^^^^  ^^^^  *^^  schoolhouse  to  the  field.     From 

sunrise  until  nine  o'clock  at  night  the  day's  round 
was  followed.  Yet  all  labored  cheerfully  and  effectively,  even 
to  the  surprise  of  their  teachers.  When  Secretary  Treat  made 
a  visit  of  inspection  in  May  of  the  second  year,  he  found  a 
farm  of  forty-five  acres  under  cultivation,  all  manner  of  mission 
buildings  finished  and  occupied,  with  some  thirty  head  of 
cattle  besides  other  stock  in  the  barns.  A  year  later,  when 
President  Monroe  unexpectedly  walked  in  to  see  exactly  how 
the  mission  was  prospering,  he  was  loud  in  his  appreciation 
of  all  that  was  being  done,  declaring  that  so  effective  a  work 
needed  even  better  equipment,  and  authorizing  the  Indian 
agent  to  provide  for  the  expense  of  a  new  and  better  house. 

Progress  along  religious  lines  was  quite  as  notable.  From 
the  first,  converts  to  the  Christian  faith  appeared.  The  church 
in  the  wilderness  grew  in  numbers  much  faster  than  in  eastern 
lands.  It  was  impressive  to  watch  some  of  the  converts,  like 
that  husky  Cherokee  half-breed,  Charles  Reece,  once  swimming 
the  river  in  the  face  of  his  enemies  to  seize  their  canoes,  now 
bowing  before  the  gospel  and  becoming  one  of  the  early  helpers 
of  the  mission ;  or  John  Arch,  who,  hearing  of  the  school 
for  his  people,  traveled  100  miles  to  Brainerd,  offering  his 
gun  to  pay  for  his  tuition  —  so  wild  in  appearance  when  he 
arrived  that  the  missionaries  hesitated  to  receive  him,  but 
soon  showing  signs  of  a  new  life,  developing  a  remarkable 
thirst  for  knowledge,  and  becoming  the  missionaries'  trusted 
interpreter  and  helper,  a  shining  witness  to  his  people  of  the 
reality  of  the  Christian  life.  The  methods  of  religious  train- 
ing were  as  rigorous  as  those  in  the  school.  Church  services 
were  frequent  and  tests  of  piety  severe.     But  Secretary  Treat 


38  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

remarked  the  tractableness  of  the  children,  and  there  seemed 
at  first  no  disposition  to  rebel  under  the  discipline. 

Such  quick  success  stirred  the  missionaries  to  greater  en- 
deavors and  strengthened  the  purpose  of  their  supporters. 
Reenforce-  Reenforcements  came  soon  and  strongly  to  these 
ments  and  missions  in  the  south.  A  prosperous  young  farmer 
Outreach-  of  New  Jersey  and  a  group  of  his  friends  arrived 
"^S  with  their  families,  offering  themselves  as  industrial 

missionaries,  adept  in  various  trades,  purposing  to  give  their 
lives  to  the  helping  of  the  Indian  races.  As  the  Board  planned 
to  make  Brainerd  simply  the  center  of  operations  for  reaching 
the  entire  Cherokee  nation,  excursions  were  frequently  made 
to  promote  acquaintance  with  the  people  and  to  find  new 
openings  for  settlements.  These  advances  were  met  with 
cordial  good-will  by  the  chiefs  who  visited  the  mission  school 
and  expressed  a  hearty  appreciation  of  its  work. 

The  purpose  to  reach  also  the  other  tribes  was  not  forgotten. 
Accordingly,  upon  arrival  of  the  first  reenforcements  at  Brain- 
Mission  to  erd,  and  after  careful  exploration  by  Mr.  Cornelius, 
the  Choc-  Messrs.  Kingsbury  and  Williams  moved  on  to  open 
taws,  1818  work  in  the  Choctaw  nation,  the  largest  of  the  four 
tribes  originally  contemplated.  The  new  mission  was  thus 
located  400  miles  southwest  of  Brainerd,  within  the  charter 
limits  of  Mississippi  and  100  miles  from  its  northern  boundary. 
Here,  also,  the  expected  buildings  were  not  found  and  the  mis- 
sionaries, though  weakened  by  sickness,  delayed  supplies,  and 
the  hardships  of  life  in  the  wilderness,  were  again  obliged  to  fell 
the  trees  and  lay  out  the  new  station,  which,  in  memory  of  the 
first  apostle  to  the  Indians,  they  named  Eliot.  There  was  no 
time  to  dwell  upon  hardships.  Before  the  buildings  were  up 
some  Choctaws  came  a  distance  of  160  miles,  bringing  eight 
promising  children  for  the  school,  which  they  supposed  was 
ready  to  receive  them.  These  first  pupils  were  crowded  into 
the  missionaries'  home,  and  teaching  was  begun  on  the  19th 
of  April. 


FOLLOWING   INDIAN  TRAILS  39 

The  round  of  work  in  school  and  on  the  farm,  and  the  weekly 
calendar  of  services  for  Indians,  half-breeds,  negroes,  and 
whites  were  much  the  same  as  at  Brainerd.  The  Choctaw 
people  ardently  welcomed  the  missionaries  and,  being  possessed 
of  fine  lands  and  considerable  wealth,  were  able  to  subscribe 
generously  toward  the  equipment  and  conduct  of  the  mission, 
the  United  States  government  joining  in  its  aid.  Within  a 
year  from  the  opening  of  the  mission,  the  Choctaw  nation  had 
voted  to  donate  the  entire  annuity  received  from  the  sale  of 
lands  to  the  United  States,  amounting  to  $500,  to  the  support 
of  the  mission  school.  While  such  material  help  was  wel- 
comed, the  missionaries  were  dismayed  at  the  prevalent  immo- 
rality, not  only  among  the  Indians,  but  among  the  white  settlers, 
whereby  all  classes  were  callous  to  the  rehgion  which  the 
newcomers  brought  them. 

A  portion  of  the  Cherokees,  amounting  in  all  to  one-third 
of  the  tribe,  had  migrated  west  of  the  Mississippi  into  the 
The  wilderness    of  the  Arkansas  and  Missouri,  inspired 

Arkansas  partly  by  their  dislike  for  the  growing  civiliza- 
Mission,  tion  of  their  old  home  and  partly  by  rumors  that 
^^^^  the    government    intended   to   transfer   them   with 

other  tribes  to  meet  the  increasing  demand  for  their  ter- 
ritory. 

In  1821,  after  careful  inquiry  and  repeated  attempts,  the 
Board  began  a  mission  also  among  this  part  of  the  Cherokees 
at  a  station  called  Dwight,  a  little  north  of  the  Arkansas 
and  nearly  500  miles,  as  the  stream  flows,  from  its  junction 
with  the  Mississippi.  It  was  a  terrific  undertaking  to 
plant  this  mission,  involving  a  journey  of  some  700  miles 
through  swamps  and  trackless  forests,  prolonged  exposure 
to  malarial  fever,  and  the  daily  dangers  of  such  pioneering. 
The  first  attempt  failed.  Upon  a  second  trial,  the  party  at 
last  staggered  on  to  their  destination.  Finally,  men  and  sup- 
plies arrived  and  the  mission  got  under  way.  Among  a  people 
wild  and  restless  and  not  too  favorably  inclined  toward  mis- 


40     STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

sionary  effort,  it  was  a  matter  of  course  that  the  beginning  of 
work  should  be  hard  and  slow. 

Thus  by  1821  the  American  Board  had  three  missions  for 
the  Indians.  Each  year  new  stations  were  added,  new  schools 
Develop-  started,  and  longer  tours  for  preaching  and  teaching 
ing  the  were  ventured  upon.  Dr.  Butrick  covered  hun- 
Establish-  dreds  of  miles  in  his  journeys  through  the  region, 
ment  entering  into  the  people's  life,  counseling  them   in 

their  affairs,  healing  many  of  their  sicknesses,  and  always  win- 
ning confidence  and  wider  influence.  If  the  church  statistics 
do  not  show  a  rapid  gain,  yet  the  leavening  influence  of  mis- 
sionary work  was  manifest.  Laws  and  courts  of  justice  were 
secured;  the  dwellings  of  the  people  were  more  comfortable  from 
year  to  year;  industry  was  more  regular  and  persistent.  Even 
the  less  progressive  Choctaws  were  persuaded  to  adopt  laws 
against  intemperance  and  the  horrible  custom  of  infanticide. 
A  factor  of  great  importance  in  the  progress  of  the  Cherokees 
was  the  invention  of  one  of  their  number,  George  Guess,  an 
ignorant  half-breed,  who  could  neither  read  nor  speak  English. 
Yet  upon  learning  the  idea  of  an  alphabet,  he  actually  devised 
one  of  eighty-six  characters,  with  a  symbol  for  every  syllable 
of  the  Cherokee  tongue.  With  this  peculiar  alphabet  he  began 
to  write  letters,  to  the  admiration  of  his  tribesmen,  who  flocked 
to  learn  the  new  method  of  easy  writing  and  reading.  In 
three  days  these  pupils  were  able  to  master  the  principles  and 
go  home  to  teach  others,  and  in  three  years  nearly  all  the  adult 
population  in  some  places,  and  of  all  the  tribe  half,  were 
capable  of  reading  their  own  language. 

One  advantage  to  the  Board  of  these  missions  to  the  southern 
Indians,  in  particular  that  to  the  Cherokees  in  Tennessee,  was 
Some  their  accessibility  to  the  common  routes  of  travel. 

Readjust-  They  had  many  visitors,  some  of  whom  came  long 
ments,  distances  to  observe  the  marvel  of  the  missionary 

^5  work  for  the  Indians;  their  high  appreciation  as  well 

as  substantial  gifts  were  a  constant  encouragement.     Govern- 


FOLLOWING  INDIAN  TRAILS  41 

ment  officials  also  made  regular  tours  of  inspection,  and  quar- 
terly grants  of  from  $200  to  $300  were  made  to  the  schools 
at  Brainerd,  Eliot,  and  Mayhew  during  the  early  '20s.  The 
secretary  of  the  Board,  also,  was  able  to  visit  these  Indian 
missions  as  he  could  not  those  over  sea.  And  while  obstacles 
seemed  almost  overpowering  in  the  foreign  field,  it  was  of  no 
small  value  to  the  missionary  cause  that  the  Indian  missions 
should  be  so  quickly  getting  hold.  In  the  year  1820  one-half 
of  the  missionaries  and  nearly  half  the  expenditures  of  the 
Board  were  for  work  among  the  Indians  of  North  America. 

The  closer  watch  entailed  a  more  direct  supervision  of  the 
work,  and  as  a  result  of  Secretary  Evarts'  visit  in  1824  certain 
changes  were  made  at  Brainerd,  with  the  intent  to  make  them 
also  in  the  other  Indian  missions.  It  was  felt  that  too  much 
stress  had  been  put  upon  merely  industrial  training.  Instead 
of  maintaining  a  large  number  of  farmers  and  mechanics,  as 
members  of  the  mission,  which  was  thus  tending  to  become 
absorbed  in  secular  pursuits,  it  was  determined  to  leave  the 
Indians  to  make  their  own  engagements  of  teachers  in  the 
arts  and  to  set  the  missionaries  free  from  these  distractions. 
And  instead  of  building  up  large  centers  of  work,  the  new 
policy  should  be  to  spread  out  the  missionary  force  as  widely 
as  possible.  At  the  same  time  it  was  decided  both  in 
Cherokee  and  Choctaw  nations  that  the  Indian  youth  in  the 
schools  should  be  taught  their  own  language  first,  the  early 
policy  of  teaching  them  nothing  but  English,  that  they  might 
become  the  more  quickly  civilized,  being  thus  modified  by 
experience. 
•  The  progress  of  the  Indian  missions  and  the  interest  they 
aroused  encouraged  the  American  Board  to  larger  undertak- 
New  ings,  while  the  breadth  of  its  fellowship  and  policies 

Missions,  opened  to  it  new  fields  of  work.  In  1826-27  the 
1826-27  United  Foreign  Missionary  Society,  an  organization 
formed  some  years  before  by  the  Presbyterians,  together  with 
the   Dutch   and  Associated   Reformed   churches,   to   conduct 


42  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

missionary  work  among  the  Indians  of  North  and  South 
America,  transferred  to  the  American  Board  the  care  of  its 
Indian  missions:  among  two  companies  of  Osages,  one  in 
Arkansas,  near  the  border  of  the  Cherokee  country,  and  the 
other  in  Missouri;  a  mission  in  the  famous  Mackinaw  region, 
the  rendezvous  for  Indians  of  all  the  northwestern  tribes; 
another  at  Maumee,  in  Ohio,  in  the  midst  of  several  small 
tribes,  and  still  another  for  various  New  York  tribes  in  the 
general  region  of  Buffalo.  At  the  same  time  the  Board 
assumed  the  care  of  the  remnant  of  the  famous  Stockbridge 
Indians,  and  of  the  Chickasaw  mission  taken  over  from  the 
Presbyterian  synod  of  South  Carolina  and  Georgia. 

The  Board's  Indian  field  was  now  widely  extended  among 
tribes  of  differing  character.  The  religious  ideas  of  many  of 
them  may  be  judged  from  the  statement  of  an  old  brave  of  the 
Osages,  who  said  that  he  knew  of  only  four  gods,  the  sun,  the 
moon,  and  two  constellations;  the  sun  required  men  to  go  to 
war  and  bring  a  scalp,  the  moon  to  bring  a  skin  for  moccasins, 
and  one  of  the  constellations  required  the  Indians  to  paint 
their  leader  when  they  go  to  war;  he  supposed  the  Osages 
would  live  after  death  at  an  old  town  on  the  Missouri,  that 
they  would  hunt  and  go  to  war,  and  that  different  tribes 
would  remain  in  different  places. 

A  dozen  years  of  work  had  wrought  great  changes  in  the 
fields  of  the  South.  The  Cherokees  were  well  up  with  their 
The  Storm  white  neighbors  in  education  and  material  pros- 
Breaks,  perity.  Christianity  was  also  accepted,  at  least 
1828  outwardly,  by  most  of  the  people.     Intemperance 

had  been  checked  and  family  life  greatly  improved.  A 
similar  development  was  manifest  among  the  Choctaws. 
Moreover,  a  religious  awakening  had  come  to  that  tribe  during 
1829,  bringing  many  hundreds  of  inquirers  to  the  missionaries, 
the  chiefs  being  the  leaders  of  their  people  in  the  new  movement. 
To  the  eager  missionaries  it  seemed  a  wonderful  display  of 
divine  power.     Altogether  there  was  a  spirit  of   great  hope- 


FOLLOWING   INDIAN  TRAILS  43 

fulness  in  the  Indian  work,  when  the  blow  fell  that  had  long 
been  dreaded. 

The  state  and  national  governments  had  joined  in  the  deter- 
mination to  move  the  Indians  of  the  South  beyond  the  Missis- 
sippi, and  apprehensions  of  this  removal  threw  the  people  of 
the  four  tribes  affected  into  great  agitation.  Efforts  to  transfer 
them  had  been  made  in  earlier  years;  before  1818  the  Choc- 
taws  had  made  three  cessions  of  their  lands,  thus  belying  the 
meaning  of  their  name  Alabama  (''Here  we  rest").  But 
not  until  1828  did  the  United  States  put  its  heavy  hand 
to  the  task  of  virtually  evicting  these  people  from  their 
land.  The  nearness  of  the  white  settlers,  which  the  mis- 
sionaries had  counted  upon  as  a  help  to  their  work,  proved 
to  be  a  double  misfortune:  their  unstable  people  had  been 
continually  exposed  to  the  temptations  of  the  white  man's 
vices;  they  were  now  to  be  made  the  victims  of  his  greed  for 
their  land. 

The  Choctaws,  and  after  them  the  Chickasaws,  were  finally 
persuaded  to  make  treaties  with  the  government,  ceding  their 
territories.  The  immediate  effect  of  this  sale  was  demoral- 
izing in  the  extreme.  Despondency,  forebodings,  lapses  into 
idleness  and  intemperance  followed  the  signing  of  the  treaty. 
The  work  of  the  mission  was  of  course  sadly  injured.  No 
provision  was  made  for  refunding  any  part  of  the  $60,000 
invested  by  the  Board  in  the  plant;  the  devoted  labor  of 
twelve  years  could  not  be  repaid  by  any  indemnity. 

The  Cherokees  resisted  to  the  utmost,  sending  protests  to 
Washington,  but  finally,  by  artifice,  intimidation,  and  false 
promises,  a  fraction  of  the  tribe  assented  to  the  new  treaty. 
Meanwhile  the  state  of  Georgia  was  proceeding  as  if  all  had 
been  settled  according  to  her  will.  The  Cherokees'  territory 
was  divided  and  sold  by  lot  while  yet  the  tribe  was  living  on 
it.  With  the  new  settlers  came  all  manner  of  vices  and  law- 
lessness. Everywhere  was  disorder  and  confusion;  bands  of 
Indians  wandered  about  in  idleness  and  despair. 


44  STORY  OF  THE  A]\1ERICAN  BOARD 

The  missionaries  were  left  in  worse  plight,  if  possible; 
maligned  by  the  whites  as  having  encouraged  the  Indians  to 
Persecu-  r^sis^t  removal  and  hated  by  the  Indians  as  belong- 
tion  of  ing  to  the  race  that  was  oppressing  them,  if  they 

Mission-       were   not    indeed   acting   as   its   secret   emissaries, 
axies  Against  both  these  misjudgments  the  Board  and  its 

missionaries  asserted  themselves  vigorously. 

Worse  treatment  was  before  some  of  these  devoted  men. 
One   of   the   blackest   pages   in  this   country's   history  is  the 
record  of  the  high-handed  procedure  against  the  missionaries 
by  the  state  of  Georgia.     A  law  had  been  passed,  evidently 
meant  to  drive   them   from  the   state.      When   thej^   ignored 
this  law,  stanchng  on  their  rights  as  United  States  citizens 
dwelhng    in    the    Cherokee    nation,    and    remained    at    their 
stations,    arrests    followed,    in    which    missionaries    of    other 
Boards  were  also  involved.     In  one  seizure,   in  July,    1831, 
]Mr.  Worcester  and   Dr.  Butler  were  both  taken.     The  story 
of  their  arrest,  imprisonment,  and  trial  is  a  record  of  brutalitj^ 
almost  beyond  belief.     On  the  way  to  the  jail  Dr.  Butler  had 
his  neck  fastened  by  a  chain  and  padlock  to  the  neck  of  a 
horse,  by  the  side  of  which  he  walked,  until  midnight,  when, 
drenched  with  rain,  the  party  reached  a  lodging-place.     All 
through  the  next  day  Dr.  Butler  wore  this  chain  about  his 
neck,  sometimes  walking  and  sometimes  permitted  to  ride  on 
the  long  journey  to  the  jail.      For  eleven  days  of  mid-sum- 
mer these  men  and  others  who  had  been  arrested  were  left 
to  lie  in  a  filthy  log  prison,  without  window,  bed,  or  other 
article  of  fmniture,  forbidden  to  receive  or  send  any  letter  or 
to  have  an  inter^^ew  with  a  friend  except  in  the  hearing  of  a 
guard,  and  forced  to  hsten  to  all  maimer  of  blasphemous  and 
obscene  taimts  as  they  were  made  the  butt  of  the  soldiers* 
ridicule.     A  favorite  joke  of  their  captors  was  to  look  in  upon 
them,  as  they  lay  awaiting  their  trial,  and  repeat  the  words 
of  the  iMaster,  ''Fear  not,  httle  flock,  for  it  is  your  Father's 
good  pleasure  to  give  you  the  kingdom.'' 


FOLLOWING   INDIAN  TRAILS  46 

Yet  these  heroes  made  the  best  of  their  circumstances, 
enlarged  some  holes  in  the  wall  for  a  little  more  light  and  air, 
and  were  grateful  that  they  no  longer  had  to  wear  chains. 
At  length  the  trial  came  off,  conducted  wholly  in  military 
fashion  and  with  much  parade.  Although  their  defense  was  ably 
argued,  the  jury  found  them  guilty  and  they  were  sentenced 
to  four  years  of  hard  labor.  The  case  being  carried  to  the 
Supreme  Court,  this  act  of  the  Georgia  tribunal  was  nullified 
and  revoked;  whereupon  the  court  of  Georgia  actually  refused 
to  yield  and  the  governor  declined  to  interfere  and  release  the 
prisoners.  Undismayed,  the  missionaries  settled  down  to  prison 
life,  and  endured  it  for  fifteen  months,  when  the  frightened 
officials  proposed  that  the  missionaries  should  be  freed  if  they 
would  drop  the  case.  With  the  finding  of  the  Supreme  Court 
as  their  vindication  the  prisoners  accepted  the  goveror's  proc- 
lamation of  release. 

Immediately  upon  their  deliverance  these  missionaries 
returned  to  their  stations  and  attempted  to  resume  their  labors. 
The  But  it  was  manifestly  impossible  to  do  any  satis- 

Forced  factory  work.     On  every  hand  settlers  were  coming 

Removal  [j^^  and  the  Indians  were  too  excited  over  the 
prospect  of  their  transfer  to  follow  the  routine  of  mission 
life. 

The  Choctaws  had  already  gone  to  their  new  home;  7000  or 
8000  of  them  were  transferred  during  the  fall  and  winter  of 
1831,  the  remaining  15,000  being  taken  the  following  year. 
The  officers  in  charge  appear  to  have  been  generally  consid- 
erate in  their  treatment.  Yet  the  suffering  and  loss  were 
heavy  and  there  was  an  appalling  amount  of  sickness  and 
death.  The  one  bright  spot  in  the  story  of  the  journey  is 
where  it  records  the  behavior  of  the  Christian  Choctaws.  By 
their  soberness  and  good  order,  their  morning  and  evening 
worship,  and  Sabbath  rest,  they  formed  a  striking  contrast 
to  some  of  their  companions.  The  captain  of  a  boat  carrying 
one  party  said  they  were  the  most  rehgious  people  he  had 


46     STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

ever  seen,  and  an  agent  declared  that  the  Choctaws  who 
had  been  under  the  influence  of  the  missionaries  were  not 
half  so  troublesome  as  the  others. 

In  1837  the  Cherokees  also  had  to  go.  They  had  been 
hoping  against  hope  that  something  would  occur  to  prevent 
the  carrying  out  of  the  treaty,  but  at  length  soldiers  came  and 
drove  them  into  an  encampment,  to  make  ready  for  the  long 
journey.  Their  transfer  was  much  like  that  of  the  Choctaws. 
The  agents  in  charge  did  their  best;  yet  the  suffering  and  want 
were  appalling.  Not  less  than  4000  deaths  were  numbered 
by  the  time  they  arrived  in  Arkansas,  ten  months  later.  In 
this  company,  too,  the  behavior  of  the  Christian  Indians  made 
a  good  impression.  Yet  the  anger  and  grief  of  their  hearts 
over  what  they  regarded  as  an  outrage  of  their  treaty  rights 
was  sorrowfully  manifest  in  the  bloodshed  that  followed  their 
reunion  with  those  already  in  Arkansas,  who,  they  felt,  had 
betrayed  them. 

In  the  case  of  the  Chickasaws  no  removal  was  necessary; 
for  having  the  proceeds  of  their  sale  of  lands  to  live  upon, 
they  so  gave  themselves  up  to  idleness,  drunkenness,  and 
gambling  that  they  faded  away  and  their  independent  existence 
was  lost.  In  this  demoralization  of  the  tribe,  nearly  one-half 
the  members  of  the  church  relapsed.  Though  some  endured 
the  temptations  and  some  were  restored,  the  situation  became 
so  hopeless  that  the  mission  was  closed  in  1835. 

When  it  became  apparent  that  the  work  among  the  Indians 
in  the  South  was  thus  to  be  broken  up  the  Board  turned  its 
attention  to  fresh  fields,  following  the  transferred 
^  ®^  tribes  to  their  new  homes  and  extending  its  Unes 
to  other  tribes  in  the  North  and  Northwest.  Suc- 
cessive tours  through  all  the  Indian  country  beyond  the  Mis- 
sissippi resulted  in  the  opening  of  a  group  of  new  missions  in 
the  early  '30s:  the  Ojibwa  (1831),  Creek  (1832),  Pawnee 
(1834),  Oregon  (Nez  Perces  and  Flathead),  Dakota  (or  Sioux), 
and  Abenaqui  (1835).     By  1836  the  tribes  within  the  hmits 


FOLLOWING  INDIAN  TRAILS  47 

of  the  states  and  territories  of  the  Union  had  practically  dis- 
appeared and  the  effort  had  been  transferred  to  lands  on  the 
western  frontier. 

Two  hnes  of  approach  were  made  to  these  western  Indians: 
from  the  South  to  each  of  the  emigrant  tribes,  Cherokees, 
Choctaws,  and  Creeks;  thence  to  the  Pawnee  country,  and, 
following  the  direction  of  Mr.  Kingsbury's  tour,  to  the  stations 
among  the  Flathead  and  Nez  Perces  Indians  by  the  Oregon 
River.  On  the  north  the  chain  of  missions  began  with  the 
Mackinaw  and  Stockbridge  Indians;  then  from  the  southwest 
shore  of  Lake  Superior  the  line  extended  through  the  Ojibwa 
country  to  the  headwaters  of  the  Mississippi,  into  the  region 
of  the  Sioux,  whose  bands  continued  westward  to  the  head- 
waters of  the  Missouri.  Thence  it  was  planned  to  extend  the 
chain  to  the  west  until  it  should  intersect  the  first  line  beyond 
the  Rocky  Mountains. 

Though  work  in  the  new  fields  was  begun  bravely  and  with 
the  wisdom  born  of  experience  on  the  part  of  missionaries,  it 
Disap-  became  more  and  more  clear  that  little  was  being 

pointing  accomplished.  It  was  not  simply  that  there  were 
Experi-  few  converts,  as  in  the  Osage  Mission,  where  after 
ences  ^^^  years  not  one  could  be  counted.     The  fact  was 

that  the  roving  and  lawless  habits  of  the  Indian,  the  inter- 
ference of  hostile  white  men,  the  growing  prejudice  against  a 
government  which  broke  its  treaties  so  lightly,  together  with 
the  repeated  removals  of  the  tribes  as  the  country  expanded, 
made  constructive  work  almost  impossible.  Many  of  these 
new  missions  were  short-lived.  The  incoming  of  whites  led  to 
the  ceasing  of  effort  for  the  Creeks  and  Osages  in  1836;  the 
shifting  of  tribal  homes  closed  the  mission  to  the  Maumees  in 
1835,  of  that  to  the  Mackinaws  in  1836,  and  to  the  Stock- 
bridge  Indians  in  1848.  The  Pawnee  mission  was  taken  over 
by  other  denominations  in  1848. 

The  mission  to  the  Sioux  was  the  only  one  of  those  more 
recently  estabhshed  which  proved  long-lived.     The  work  for 


48  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

this  largest  and  most  warlike  tribe  on  the  continent,  dwelling 

on  the  upper  Mississippi  and  its  tributaries  and  roaming  over 

Minnesota  and  west  to  the  Black  Hills,  was  begun  under  the 

lead  of  Dr.   Williamson   and   the   brothers  Pond,   and  soon 

branched  out  from  its  center  at  Fort  Snelling  over  a  wide  area. 

It  was  the  roughest  sort  of  life  which  these  missionaries 

to  the  Sioux  experienced.      The  tribe  lived  in  typical  Indian 

fashion,   in   wigwams,    and   tepees,   swinging   from 

^^^,.^.         plenty  to  famine,  according  to  the  fortunes  of  the 
Conditions     ^        -^     ,tt, -i       i  •     •  •  ^  ^^      -, 

hunt.      While  the  missionaries  were  not  obliged  to 

dwell  with   the   Indians,   they   had   to   share   much   of  their 

life;  mention  is  made  of  hickory  chips  being  boiled  to  get 

nourishment.     With   two   locations   from   the   first,    at   Lake 

Harriet,  near  the  Falls  of  St.  Anthony,  and  at  Lac-qui-parle, 

the   missionaries   had  at  least  a  fixed   habitation,  while  the 

tribe,  roving  here  and  there,  were  sometimes  near  them  and 

sometimes  far  away. 

It  was  slow  work  at  best  and  a  test  of  patience  and  faith. 
The  religion  of  the  Sioux  seemed  to  the  missionaries  full  of 
superstition  and  fear,  a  pantheism  running  down  to  devil- 
worship.  The  braves  held  the  message  of  the  gospel  to  be 
womanish,  and  taunted  any  who  listened  to  it.  Yet  prog- 
ress was  made  and  characters  were  transformed,  like  that 
of  Joseph  Renville,  the  half-breed  agent  of  the  American 
Fur  Company,  who  acted  as  interpreter  for  the  mission- 
aries, and  whose  home  was  ever  a  hospitable  resting-place 
for  them. 

By  1850  two  churches  had  been  formed,  with  some  steadfast 
and  consistent  members,  though  lapses  were  frequent  and 
distressing.  Here,  as  elsewhere  in  missionary  labor,  the  more 
evident  the  progress,  the  fiercer  the  opposition  became.  One 
of  the  signs  of  increasing  influence  was  an  intense  spirit  of 
persecution. 

The  unhappy  experience  of  trying  to  work  for  Indians  just 
where  they  met  the  tide  of  white  emigration  prompted  the 


FOLLOWING   INDIAN  TRAILS  49 

desire  to  open  a  mission  beyond  the  frontier  where  the  mis- 
sionaries might  escape  its  influence  for  evil.  Several  explor- 
The  Ore-  ing  tours  were  made,  one  in  1829  on  the  Pacific 
gon  Indi-  coast  by  Rev.  J.  S.  Green,  a  Sandwich  Islands  mis- 
ans,  1836  sionary,  with  no  encouraging  result.  Other  parties 
went  overland  across  the  Rockies  in  1834-35.  Rev.  Samuel 
Parker  and  Dr.  Marcus  Whitman,  a  physician  from  New  York 
state,  made  up  the  second  party.  So  long  before  as  1804-06 
Lewis  and  Clark,  on  their  tour  to  the  coast,  had  promised 
to  send  to  the  Nez  Perces  Inchans  the  desired  religious  teachers. 
After  the  Indians  had  waited  long  in  vain,  upon  some  further 
Christian  teaching  from  a  few  fur  traders,  a  deputation  of 
five  was  despatched  to  St.  Louis,  where  they  stirred  the  hearts 
of  the  Christian  public  by  their  pathetic  lament  for  the  mis- 
sionaries that  had  not  come. 

It  was  partly  in  answer  to  their  appeal  that,  as  the  Ameri- 
can Board  pathfinders  came  upon  a  band  of  these  Nez  Perces, 
the  mission  to  the  Northwest  Indians  was  located  in  what  is 
now  the  state  of  Washington,  with  Dr.  and  Mrs.  Whitman  at 
Waiilatpu,  near  the  present  city  of  Walla  Walla,  among  the 
Kayuses,  and  with  Rev.  H.  H.  Spalding  and  wife,  among  the 
Nez  Perces,  near  the  northern  boundary  of  the  territory.  So 
remote  was  this  new  mission  that  literally  the  longest  way 
round  was  the  shortest  way  home,  most  of  the  supplies  being 
sent  to  the  missionaries  by  way  of  the  Sandwich  Islands. 
Indeed,  Dr.  Whitman's  first  helper  was  a  Christian  Sandwich 
Islander  who  had  come  to  the  Pacific  coast.  Another  con- 
nection with  the  Board's  mission  in  mid-Pacific  was  established 
when,  a  printing  press  being  needed  for  the  Oregon  Indians, 
the  old  mission  press,  no  longer  required  in  the  Sandwich 
Islands,  was  sent  to  become  a  part  of  the  equipment  of  the 
new  field. 

I  Reenforcements  followed  along  the  difficult  trail,  and  at 
the  same  time  the  Methodists  opened  a  mission  in  the  Willa- 
mette valley.     As  the  Indians  were  hospitable  and  ready  to 


50     STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

help,  a  Christian  church  was  soon  estabhshed.  At  first  it 
seemed  that  a  strong  impression  was  to  be  made;  but  as  time 
went  on  and  curiosity  slackened  the  Indians  became  indifferent, 
in  some  cases  hostile.  Discouragement  and  some  disagreement 
followed  among  members  of  the  mission.  By  1842  the  ques- 
tion of  contracting  the  field  was  being  discussed  and  the  Pru- 
dential Committee  had  even  voted  that  the  southern  station 
should  be  closed.  A  meeting  of  the  mission,  called  to  consider 
the  situation,  decided  that  this  action  was  not  wise  and  urged 
that  Dr.  Whitman  should  visit  ''the  United  States"  to  see 
if  it  could  not  be  revoked.  The  story  of  that  hurried  journey 
has  become  so  famous  in  American  history  that  it  need  not 
be  retold  here.  For  by  the  testimony  of  fellow  mission- 
aries and  from  various  other  contemporary  sources  it  has 
been  brought  out  that  the  second,  some  say  the  primary 
object  of  Whitman's  ride,  was  to  save  Oregon  to  the  United 
States. 

This  exploit  of  Dr.  Whitman  has  come  to  be  challenged  as 
a  myth;  both  his  purpose  and  his  accomplishment  have  been 
made  the  subject  of  almost  fierce  controversy.  The  denials 
upon  one  side  have  been  far  more  sweeping  than  the  claims 
upon  the  other.  Much  of  the  "evidence"  has  been  challenged 
as  inconclusive  and  even  as  manifestly  false.  In  the  face  of 
this  bitter  dispute  and  with  all  the  data  not  fully  tested,  one 
may  hesitate  to  express  an  absolute  or  final  judgment.  But 
certain  facts  are  evident  from  the  records  of  the  American 
Board  and  from  other  unimpeachable  testimony  that  has  been 
slowly  gathered.  It  is  clear  that  there  were  difficulties  in 
mission  management  which  prompted  the  sending  of  Whitman 
to  Boston;  it  is  no  less  clear  that  he  was  much  concerned  as  to 
the  settlement  of  the  Oregon  country  and  eager  that  the  inter- 
ests of  the  United  States,  and  particularly  Protestant  interests, 
should  be  dominant  therein,  so  eager  indeed  that  the  officers 
of  the  Board  and  some  of  his  fellow  missionaries  felt  that 
Whitman  had  been  too  much  diverted  from  his  missionary 


FOLLOWING    INDIAN  TRAILS  51 

"work  to  activity  in  public  affairs.  Competent  witnesses  estab- 
lish at  least  these  facts :  his  daring  ride,  his  visit  to  Washington, 
his  interview  with  President  Tyler,  his  satisfactory  explanation 
of  his  conduct  and  plans  to  the  Board's  officers  in  Boston,  and 
his  return  to  the  mission  as  companion  and  helper,  if  not 
actually  organizer  of  an  emigrant  band  that  brought  new 
settlers  with  wagons  into  the  territory  whose  destiny  was  at 
stake.  Unquestionably  lapses  of  memory,  possibly  flights  of 
imagination,  are  discoverable  in  some  of  the  reminiscences  of 
those  who  have  contributed  to  the  story.  But  there  are  too 
many  honest  witnesses  and  too  many  precise  and  corrobo- 
rative statements  to  permit  the  brushing  aside  of  the  whole 
story  as  a  myth.  After  making  just  allowance  for  what  may 
be  legendary,  the  figure  of  Marcus  Whitman  as  missionary 
hero  and  statesman  is  left  fundamentally  as  historical  as  that 
of  Paul  Revere. 

Another  dramatic  event  which  gave  fame  to  the  Oregon 
Mission  was  its  sudden  close  in  the  massacre  of  1847.  There 
The  Ore-  had  been  signs  of  trouble  during  the  preceding 
gon  Mas-  winter.  The  causes  are  not  altogether  clear.  It 
sacre  ^^s  said  that  an  unusual  amount  of  sickness  had  by 

some  been  charged  to  Dr.  Whitman's  medicine.  It  came  out 
later  that  the  plot  contemplated  the  slaying  only  of  American 
missionaries;  Frenchmen  and  Roman  Catholics  were  to  be 
spared,  which  facts  point  to  certain  influences  as  fomenting  dis- 
cord. The  execution  of  the  plot  was  swift  and  terrible.  Almost 
before  the  company  in  the  mission  premises  at  Waiilatpu 
realized  what  was  coming,  the  Indians  burst  into  the  house 
and  the  first  deadly  blow  was  struck.  Details  are  too  revolting 
to  be  related  here.  All  the  cruel  ingenuity  of  the  savage  was 
let  loose.  Both  Dr.  and  Mrs.  Whitman  were  ruthlessly  slaugh- 
tered, while  the  surviving  children  were  assembled  to  be  shot 
in  the  room  where  their  father  lay,  horribly  cut  and  mangled, 
but  still  breathing.  But  for  some  reason  at  last  the  com- 
mand was  given  to  spare  them. 


52  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

Through  the  efforts  of  the  Hudson  Bay  Company  and  the 
cooperation  of  some  friendly  Indians,  the  survivors  of  the 
massacre  and  the  missionaries  at  other  stations  were  quickly 
brought  to  safety.  The  escape  of  several,  in  particular  of 
Mr.  Spalding,  was  marvelous.  In  the  face  of  this  crushing 
disaster  it  was  manifestly  impossible  to  continue  the  mission 
in  so  lonely  and  indefensible  locations.  All  the  stations  were 
soon  abandoned;  most  of  the  missionaries,  however,  remaining 
in  the  territory,  where  some  of  them,  notably  Mr.  Spalding  and 
Cushing  EeUs,  were  yet  to  render  distinguished  service.  Not 
for  many  years  and  then  under  other  auspices  did  the  way 
open  to  reestablish  a  mission  on  this  martyr  ground. 

Since  there  were  many  southern  churches  of  one  denomina- 
tion or  another  in  the  constituency,  it  was  inevitable  that  the 
Anti-  American  Board  should  be  involved  in  the  early 

Slavery  agitation  over  slavery.  In  the  settlements  among 
Questions  Cherokees  and  Choctaws  there  were  from  the  begin- 
ning negro  slaves.  Not  a  few  Indians  were  slaveholders,  and 
some  of  them  became  members  of  the  native  churches.  A 
slave  and  his  owner  were  occasionally  found  in  the  same  church 
or  Christian  community.  So  early  as  1840  a  memorial  was 
presented  to  the  Board  at  its  annual  meeting  by  ministers 
from  New  York  state  remonstrating  against  the  solicitation 
of  gifts  from  slaveholders  or  slaveholding  states.  The  next  year 
it  was  New  Hampshire  ministers  who  presented  a  memorial. 
They  recognized  that  the  Board  had  been  '^  goaded  in  unchris- 
tian methods,"  and  "censured  for  not  carrying  out  plans  that 
were  neither  wise  nor  good";  but  they  declared  that  the  Board 
should  not  keep  silence,  but  make  known  its  views  and  feel- 
ings in  the  matter.  The  answer,  repeated  year  by  year  to  these 
memorials,  was  that  while  the  Board  could  sustain  no  relation 
to  slavery  which  implied  approbation  or  sympathy,  it  could 
not  declare  itself  in  measures  against  this  system  any  more 
than  against  any  other  specific  form  of  evil  existing  in  the 
community.     It  had  one  definite  task  to  do,  and  it  could  not 


FOLLOWING   INDIAN  TRAILS  63 

be  diverted  to  become  an  agitator  or  a  makeweight  on  either 
side  of  the  controversy.  As  the  years  went  on  and  the  anti- 
slavery  agitation  became  more  bitter,  this  non-committal  atti- 
tude was  increasingly  unsatisfactory,  the  debates  at  the  annual 
meetings  grew  more  intense  and  the  policy  of  the  Board  less 
confident.  By  1842  there  were  threats  of  another  missionary 
society.  Indeed,  the  American  Missionary  Association,  founded 
in  1846,  and  which  set  out  to  serve  the  heathen  abroad  as  well 
as  the  negroes  at  home,  was  designed  to  be  an  effective  protest 
against  what  its  founders  deplored  as  a  timid  and  compromising 
attitude. 

Later,  when  opinion  cleared  and  hardened,  the  American 
Board  began  to  express  itself  more  distinctly  as  opposed  to 
slavery.  An  earnest,  not  to  say  sharp  correspondence  followed 
between  the  officers  of  the  Board  and  its  missionaries  among 
the  Cherokees  and  Choctaws.  Even  so  fine  and  loyal  a  soul 
as  Mr.  Kingsbury,  one  of  the  founders  of  the  mission,  pleaded 
for  the  continuance  of  a  temporizing  policy  until  conditions 
should  change,  declaring  that  while  they  abhorred  slavery 
the  missionaries  to  the  southern  Indians,  situated  as  they 
were,  could  not  break  sharply  with  it. 

The  situation  was  difficult  and  delicate.  On  the  one  hand 
was  the  rather  violent,  uncompromising  abolitionist,  who 
sought  to  make  the  Board  his  advocate;  on  the  other,  were 
some  of  its  devoted  missionaries  and  their  loyal  converts  and 
church  members,  who  pleaded  that  the  Board  was  disrupting 
its  missions  by  allowing  itself  to  become  a  court  of  appeal  in 
questions  that  were  outside  of  its  jurisdiction.  Between  these 
extremes  stood  the  large  constituency  of  the  Board,  arraying 
itself  more  and  more  against  slavery,  yet  disposed  to  move 
cautiously  and  patiently,  and  desirous  not  to  involve  the 
Board  more  than  was  necessary  in  disputes  it  could  not  settle. 
It  is  not  to  be  wondered  at,  or  perhaps  to  be  deprecated,  that 
the  course  of  the  Board  was  somewhat  temporizing  until  the 
sentiment  had  strengthened  and  the  progress  of  events  made 


54     STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

it  possible  to  cut  out  the  sore  without  destroying  the  Hfe  of 
the  missions.  And  if  some  of  the  old  supporters  of  the  Board 
were  ahenated,  their  defection  occasioned  the  American  Mis- 
sionary Association.  That  result,  like  the  withdrawal  of  Judson 
from  the  first  mission  of  the  American  Board,  though  regarded 
at  the  time  as  a  calamity,  has  proved  to  be  a  gain  to  the 
kingdom  of  God. 

A  review  of  the  Indian  missions,  after  a  generation  of  effort, 
prompts  some  disappointment.  Fields  undertaken  at  great 
A  Resume  ^^^^  ^^  ^^^  ^^^  money  were  already  closed;  others 
of  the  were  languishing.    Before  the  flood  of  white  immigra- 

Period,  tion,  the  red  man  was  slowly  but  surely  falling  back 
1850  Qj.  falling   under.     The   extinction  of   some   tribes 

was  imminent.  The  Indian  tribes  were  not,  however,  by  any 
means  alike:  they  differed  as  do  the  various  white  peoples. 
Forest  tribes  were  ever  more  amenable  to  missionary  work 
than  those  of  the  prairie;  the  eastern  and  southern  tribes  were 
more  inclined  to  adopt  civilized  ways  than  the  more  savage  and 
degraded  Indians  of  the  West.  But  all  were  kept  unsettled 
and  irritated  by  their  frequent  transfers.  The  white  man's 
word  came  to  be  little  respected,  so  that  the  reputation  and 
good-will  of  the  missionaries  were  seriously  hurt  in  the  eyes 
of  those  who  inclined  to  regard  them  as  of  like  character 
with  the  rest  of  their  race.  While  many  of  the  government 
agents  were  men  of  good  principles  and  just  intent,  the  careless 
or  wanton  action  of  one  official  often  spoiled  much  good  ser- 
vice. Sometimes  the  example  of  the  Indian  agents  as  weU 
as  of  white  traders  was  desperately  bad. 

But  this  view  of  the  situation,  though  true  to  facts,  does 
not  represent  all  the  facts  or  rightly  measure  the  value  of  the 
work  which  had  been  done  so  far  by  these  missions  to  the 
aborigines  of  America.  In  spite  of  all  obstacles  and  interrup- 
tions, and  the  difficulty  of  the  Indian's  nature  and  life,  solid 
results  were  evident.  Some  tribes  were  now  fairly  to  be 
called  civilized,  having  all  the  customs,  laws,  and  institutions 


FOLLOWING   INDIAN  TRAILS  55 

of  Christian  states  and  communities.  Industry  and  thrift  had 
been  instilled  into  natures  predisposed  to  idleness.  Thousands 
had  been  won  to  the  Christian  way  and  gathered  into  church 
membership.  And  in  all  the  missions  there  were  shiuing 
examples  of  Christian  character  and  life.  The  cause  of  tem- 
perance, which  touched  the  Indian's  besetting  sin,  had  so  far 
advanced  in  some  of  the  nations,  notably  the  Cherokee  and 
Choctaw  tribes,  that  the  general  sentiment  of  the  people  was 
against  the  sale  of  intoxicating  liquors  within  their  boundaries. 
Conspicuous  among  the  missionary  achievements  of  the  period 
are  to  be  reckoned  these  Indian  missions  wherein  a  heroic 
and  devoted  company  had  proved  themselves  true  witnesses 
of  Christ  to  his  needy  ones;  in  the  very  spirit  of  their  Master 
they  laid  down  their  lives  for  those  who  often  behaved  as 
their  enemies. 


Chapter  IV  ■• 

TRANSFORMING  THE  SANDWICH  ISLANDS 

The  beginning  of    the  American  Board's   mission  to  the 
Sandwich  Islands  Hes  back  of  the  organization  of  the  Board 

itself.  When  Samuel  Mills  came  down  from  Will- 
^^^    .         iams  College  to  be  a  graduate  student  at  Yale,  he 

found  there  Henry  Obookiah.  This  lad  had  left 
the  islands  during  a  civil  war  in  which  his  father  and  mother 
had  been  killed  before  his  eyes,  and  his  infant  brother  speared 
to  death  as  he  was  carrying  him  on  his  back.  The  kindly 
sea  captain,  with  whom  he  found  refuge,  brought  him  and  two 
other  waifs  to  this  country  and  to  New  Haven.  There  Oboo- 
kiah was  discovered  one  day  on  the  steps  of  the  college,  crying 
for  sheer  loneliness  and  with  hunger  for  the  education  which 
he  saw  others  were  getting.  To  the  flaming  heart  of  Mills 
the  boy's  story  of  his  land  and  its  people  was  irresistible.  He 
reported  it  to  Gordon  Hall:  ''What  does  this  mean?  Brother 
Hall,  do  you  understand  it?  Shall  he  be  sent  back  unsup- 
ported to  attempt  to  reclaim  his  countrymen?  Shall  we  not 
rather  consider  these  southern  islands  a  proper  place  for  the 
establishment  of  a  mission?"  From  that  time  the  Sandwich 
Islands  were  not  out  of  the  minds  of  some  of  the  founders  of 
American  foreign  missions.  Obookiah  died  before  he  was 
ready  to  return  to  his  people,  and  his  death  reenforced  the 
appeal  to  send  them  missionaries. 

The  first  band  was  ready  to  be  sent  out  in  October,  1819. 
After  prolonged  and  impressive  services  in  Park  Street  Church, 
The  First  Boston,  including  the  organizing  of  the  adults  into 
Mission-  a  church  and  the  celebration  of  the  Lord's  Supper 
aries  \^y  ^  great  company,  the  party  embarked,  Saturday, 

the  23d,  on  the  brig  Thaddeus,  for  the  long  voyage  to  the  Pacific. 

56 


THE    POISON   GOD 


THEN   AND   NOW   IN   THE   SANDWICH   ISLANDS 


TRANSFORMING  THE  SANDWICH  ISLANDS     57 

There  were  twenty-one  in  the  party :  two  ordained  missionaries, 
Rev.  Messrs.  Bingham  and  Thurston,  two  teachers,  a  physi- 
cian, a  printer,  and  a  farmer,  the  wives  and  children  of  these 
men,  and  three  natives  of  the  Sandwich  Islands,  young  men 
who,  hke  Obookiah,  had  been  trained  in  the  foreign  mission 
school  at  Cornwall,  Conn.,  and  were  believed  to  be  prepared 
for  Christian  work  among  their  own  people. 

The  five  months'  voyage  around  the  Horn  gave  time  for 
speculation  as  to  what  might  befall  the  party  on  their  arrival. 
A  Sur-  Would  they  be  allowed  to  land?  If  so,  would  it 
prising  be  peace  or  war?     What  shocking  idolatry,  cruel 

Reception  sacrifices,  and  revolting  superstitions  would  they 
face?  The  prospect  tested  courage.  For  the  judgment  of 
Captain  Cook,  who  discovered  the  island,  that  a  white  man 
would  not  be  safe  there,  had  been  justified  by  his  own  murder; 
while  in  the  neighboring  Society  Islands  EngUsh  missionaries 
had  but  just  won  out  in  a  struggle  for  very  fife.  Imagine  the 
amazement  of  these  Americans  when  they  reached  Hawaii  and 
sent  Hopu  ashore  to  have  him  come  quickly  back,  waving  his 
hat  and  shouting,  '^Oahu's  idols  are  no  more!"  It  seemed 
that  when  the  old  king  Kamehameha  had  died  in  the  pre- 
ceding May,  his  son  had  straightway  overthrown  the  religion 
of  the  land,  abolishing  its  rules  and  rites,  deposing  the  priest- 
hood, forbidding  idolatry  and  human  sacrifice,  and  doing  all 
this  with  the  consent  of  the  high  priests  and  the  approval  of 
the  people.  The  idols  were  burned  or  dumped  into  the  sea. 
The  missionaries  found  a  land  that  had  disposed  of  its  tradi- 
tional religion  and  was  ready  for  another. 

This  overthrow  of  idolatry  was  not  due  to  the  awakening 
of  a  higher  religious  idea;  it  was  only  a  revolt  from  an  unbear- 
Not  a  ^ble  oppression.     The  chief  feature  of  the  Hawaiian 

Religious  religious  system  was  the  tabu,  in  some  respects  a 
Reforma-  more  terrible  bondage  than  caste  in  India.  For  it 
**^^  was  a  rigid  system  of  prohibition  touching  every 

person  and  all    his  possessions  and  actions.     It  put  into  the 


58  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

hands  of  higher  personages,  chiefs  and  priests,  the  weapon  of 
an  absolute  and  arbitrary  control  by  which  they  could  claim 
or  doom  whatever  they  would.  The  penalty  of  tabu  was 
death;  the  fear  of  it  made  hfe  one  long  terror.  It  was  the 
growing  revolt  against  this  burden,  particuarly  bound  up  with 
the  exercises  of  religion,  that  enabled  LihoHho  to  wipe  out  at 
once  and  completely  the  religion  of  the  island.  When  the 
king,  albeit  in  a  drunken  orgy,  himself  broke  the  tabu,  by 
eating  swine  flesh,  the  news  spread  through  all  the  islands  and 
the  old  system  was  forever  abandoned. 

Although  the  missionaries  rejoiced  with  gratitude  to  God 
that  their  arrival  should  have  been  so  well  timed,  it  was  by 
The  Stu-  110  means  a  small  or  easy  task  which  was  left  to 
pendous  them.  Notwithstanding  their  break  with  the  past, 
Task  these   islanders   could   hardly  yet   be   called   other 

than  savages  like  the  rest  of  the  Polynesians.  It  was  their 
habit  to  put  out  of  the  way  the  aged  and  the  infirm,  casting 
them  over  precipices  or  burying  them  alive.  Cripples  were 
the  common  object  of  sport  even  to  the  children,  and  sympathy 
and  kindness  were  almost  unknown.  Naturally  a  well-formed 
and  vigorous  people,  apparently  of  the  Malay  race,  they  were 
so  depleted  by  war  and  vice  that  their  number  had  decreased 
from  perhaps  300,000  to  about  130,000. 

The  ten  islands  making  up  the  group  had  altogether  an  area 
less  than  that  of  Massachusetts,  cut  up  into  little  kingdoms, 
till  the  masterful  Kamehameha  I  brought  all  under  his  sway. 
Such  civilization  as  he  could  command  he  adopted,  securing 
some  vessels,  building  forts  and  drilling  his  soldiers;  but  no 
real  progress  in  the  arts  had  been  made.  There  was  no  written 
language  nor  any  thought  of  one,  no  commerce,  trade,  or 
regular  industry.  The  people  lived  chiefly  on  the  few  tropical 
products  of  their  islands,  with  an  occasional  delicacy  of  raw 
fish.  They  had  not  even  learned  to  use  the  sugar-cane  or 
arrow-root  that  were  growing  all  about  them.  As  for  their 
home  life,  they  lived  in  the  rudest  of  low  hovels.     Men,  women, 


TRANSFORMING  THE  SANDWICH  ISLANDS     59 

and  children  crowded  into  the  one  room,  where  they  slept  on 
the  ground  covered  with  grass  or  a  thin  mat,  with  the  domestic 
animals  huddled  round  them,  and  rose  in  the  morning  to  eat 
from  the  same  calabash  of  poi,  their  fingers  serving  as  knives 
and  forks;  at  the  close  of  the  meal  the  great  pipe  was  passed 
about  from  father  to  four-year-old  child. 

Under  such  physical  conditions,  it  was  not  surprising  to 
find  the  moral  status  of  the  people  terribly  low;  and  it  was 
Moral  at  almost  its  lowest  point  wlicn  the  missionaries 

Degrada-  arrived.  Marriage  and  famil}^  ties  were  scarcely 
tion  regarded.     Children    were    not    desired,    and    were 

seldom  taken  care  of  by  their  own  parents.  If  nobody  would 
take  them,  they  were  strangled  or  buried  alive.  There  was 
no  sense  of  modesty;  not  only  children,  but  men  and  women 
for  the  most  part  went  without  clothing.  The  king,  with  his 
five  wives,  called  on  Mr.  Ruggles  just  as  they  came  from  the 
surf;  when  reproved,  he  came  the  next  time  wearing  a  pair  of 
silk  stockings  and  a  hat! 

The  eighth  commandment  was  as  little  regarded  as  the 
seventh;  thievery  was  everywhere.  The  people  were  a  race 
of  gamblers,  and  since  they  had  come  into  touch  with  the 
white  men,  were  fast  becoming  a  race  of  drunkards.  With 
no  regular  habits  of  work,  gorging  themselves  when  there  was 
plenty  and  fasting  when  there  was  little,  turning  night  into 
day,  living  entirely  by  impulse  and  as  circumstances  made 
easy,  they  were  so  indolent,  brutish,  and  unrehable  that  it  was 
a  desperate  outlook  for  those  who  came  with  the  hope  of  win- 
ning them  to  Christian  life  and  civilization. 

A  fortnight's  conference  was  required  to  settle  the  question 
whether  the  missionaries  should  be  received.  Before  the  king 
A  Wel-  and  his  trusted  counselors,  the  two  wives  of  his 
come  and  father,  Keopuolani  and  Kaahumanu,  the  prime 
Location  minister,  Kalanimoku,  known  by  the  foreigners  as 
''Billy  Pitt,"  and  other  chiefs  and  governors,  women  as  well 
as  men,  the  newcomers  stated  their  case,  asking  permission  to 


60     STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

remain  for  a  year  on  trial.  Here,  as  in  Turkey,  the  fact  that 
the  missionaries  had  brought  their  wives  convinced  a  suspi- 
cious people  that  they  had  come  to  dwell  and  not  to  plunder. 
The  Sandwich  Islands  chiefs  said,  ''If  they  had  come  to  fight 
they  would  not  have  brought  their  women."  Their  request 
was  granted,  and  they  were  allowed  to  occupy  three  stations, 
Kailua  on  Hawaii,  Honolulu  on  Oahu,  and  Waimea  on  Kauai. 
The  king  showed  them  such  hospitahty  as  he  had  to  offer, 
providing  for  the  temporary  shelter  of  these  twenty-two  per- 
sons, "a  large  barn-like  thatched  structure,  without  floor, 
ceihng,  partition,  windows,  or  furniture."  Soon  the  company 
divided  to  occupy  the  several  stations.  When  a  little  later 
the  court  was  transferred  to  Honolulu,  the  Thurstons,  not 
daring  to  stay  in  Kailua  without  the  protection  of  the  king's 
presence,  followed  him  to  the  new  capital.  It  is  worthy  of 
note,  perhaps,  that  the  act  of  a  coarse  priest  in  Kailua,  who 
attempted  to  lay  his  hands  upon  Mrs.  Thurston  one  day  while 
her  husband  was  at  the  school,  was  the  only  insult  ever  offered 
by  a  native  of  the  islands  to  the  missionary  ladies. 

The  starting  of  work  among  such  a  people  involved  not 
only  learning  their  language,  but  reducing  it  to  written  form. 
The  Press  As  the  alphabet  was  short  and  simple,  this  was  not 
and  the  difficult.  Within  two  years  it  was  possible  to  use 
School  the  printing  press,  and  by  the  beginning  of  1822 

the  first  sheet  was  printed.  Schools  were  soon  opened,  pupils 
coming  from  the  families  of  the  chiefs,  the  king  himself  being 
one  of  them.  It  was  considered  to  be  a  prerogative  of  royalty 
to  have  the  earliest  benefit  of  what  the  missionaries  brought. 
The  governors  of  the  islands  thought  that  each  of  them  should 
have  a  resident  missionary  as  a  sort  of  private  tutor,  and  the 
schools  were  largely  extended  through  the  patronage  of  the 
chiefs.  When  a  native  teacher  was  made  ready,  the  chiefs 
who  were  interested  would  send  him  out  to  teach  in  one  of  the 
districts,  ordering  the  head  men  to  furnish  support  and  equip- 
ment, thus  distributing  teachers  among  the  islands.     A  few 


TRANSFORMING  THE  SANDWICH  ISLANDS      61 

of  the  Hawaiians  were  taught  the  rudiments  of  Enghsh,  but 
the  main  effort  was  to  reach  the  islanders  through  their 
native  speech. 

The  first  steps  in  this  missionary  work  were  even  less  pre- 
tentious  than   teaching  primary   schools   or   preaching   short 
sermons  in  broken  speech.     Before  all,  it  was  neces- 

„  ,.^.  sary  to  create  a  desire  for  better  things.  Here 
Conditions  •;  .     .  ,.       .,  .  , 

agam  the  value  of  the  missionary  family  was  evident, 

with  its  example  of  a  Christian  home  and  the  manners  of  a 
Christian  civilization.  Mr.  Bingham  has  described  a  mission- 
ary's wife  cutting  and  fitting  a  dress  for  the  queen,  who  would 
hardly  stop  from  her  gambUng  long  enough  to  try  it  on,  and 
then  would  reject  it  with  a  curt  ''Too  tight!  Off  with  it! 
Do  it  over!"  And  while  the  poor  missionary  was  trying  to 
show  the  queen's  serving-women  how  to  make  her  dresses,  a 
pet  hog  was  burrowing  in  the  cloth  like  a  puppy.  Such  min- 
istry seems  very  humble  and  petty,  but  it  was  necessary  if 
any  progress  was  to  be  made,  and  it  was  undertaken  without 
a  murmur. 

The  hardships  of  missionary  life  in  those  early  days  were  cor- 
respondingly heavy  and  inevitable.  At  first,  no  house  could  be 
secured  but  a  one-roomed  hut  like  those  of  the  natives ;  cooking 
was  often  done  outdoors.  For  more  than  a  decade  these  men 
and  women  of  culture  lived  in  thatched  houses  with  the  very 
barest  and  simplest  furniture.  In  the  matter  of  food  they 
were  reduced  almost  to  the  fare  of  the  natives.  No  milk  could 
be  had  for  several  years.  Such  salt  meats  and  hard  bread 
as  could  be  obtained  from  ships,  with  the  fruits  that  the  land 
afforded,  were  the  staples  of  fare.  Supplies  were  forwarded 
from  the  United  States,  but  so  long  was  the  voyage  and  so 
slow  the  transfer  that,  as  Mr.  Coan  once  wrote:  "Our  news 
became  old  and  our  provisions  stale  before  they  reached  us, 
while  our  stationery  might  be  exhausted,  our  medicines  ex- 
pended, our  flour  moldy  and  full  of  worms  before  the  new 
supplies  arrived.     Many  a  time  have  we  been  obliged  to  break 


62     STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

up  our  barrel  of  hardened  flour  with  an  ax."  Yet  as  they 
shared  the  native  Hfe  in  these  outward  conditions,  the  mis- 
sionaries won,  more  quickly  than  otherwise  they  could  have 
done,  the  confidence  and  good-will  of  the  people  to  whom  they 
had  come. 

The  arrival  in  1822  of  Rev.  William  Ellis,  one  of  the  London 
Missionary  Society's  men  in  the  Society  Islands,  who  hap- 
pened to  visit  Honolulu  en  route  to  the  Marquesas 
.  ^  .^  ^  group,  was  of  immense  help  to  the  young  mission. 

For  it  chanced  that  the  foreign  residents  of  Honolulu 
were  then  conspiring  by  false  arguments  as  to  the  state  of 
affairs  in  the  Society  Islands  to  persuade  king  Liholiho  to 
banish  the  missionaries.  The  coming  of  Mr.  Ellis  and  his 
native  associates  brought  direct  and  effective  denial  of  these 
charges,  and  swung  the  balance  in  the  missionaries'  favor. 
Moreover,  the  party  were  persuaded  to  remain  for  a  year  or 
more  as  helpers  in  the  Sandwich  Islands  Mission,  where  they 
were  the  first  to  preach  freely  to  the  people  in  the  Hawaiian 
speech.  When  a  substantial  reenforcement  was  made  to  the 
mission  in  1823,  including  seven  new  missionaries  and  three 
more  Hawaiians  from  the  Cornwall  school,  it  became  possible 
to  broaden  the  field  of  work.  A  tour  of  exploration  was  made 
around  the  large  island  of  Hawaii  and  new  stations  were  soon 
opened  at  Hilo  and  Puna  on  the  eastern  side  and  at  Lahaina 
on  Maui. 

Soon  it  became  fashionable  to  belong  to  the  mission  school 
and  to  listen  to  the  preaching  of  the  missionaries.  Some  of 
the  chiefs  began  to  give  genuine  evidence  that  they  were  taking 
the  truth  of  the  gospel  to  heart.  Keopuolani,  now  the  wife 
of  the  governor  of  Maui,  was  in  1823  the  first  native  to  receive 
the  seal  of  baptism,  and  Kaumualii,  the  banished  king  of 
Kauai,  compelled  to  live  under  the  eye  of  the  king  at  Oahu, 
became  a  devoted  friend  and  patron  of  the  mission.  When  he 
died,  instead  of  the  customary  carouse  upon  the  death  of  a  chief. 
Christian  prayer  and  song  marked  the  service  in  his  memory. 


TRANSFORMING  THE  SANDWICH  ISLANDS     63 

The  death  of  the  king  and  queen,  during  an  ill-starred  visit 
to  England,  in   1824,   proved  a  blessing  to  the  missionaries. 

For  although  Liholiho  countenanced  and  even  aided 
.  the  introduction  of  Christianity,  by  his  example  he 

encouraged  the  coarsest  vices.  Upon  his  departure 
Kaahumanu  became  regent,  and  the  advantage  of  her  strong 
and  steady  character  was  immediately  felt.  Moreover,  the 
responsibilities  of  office  soon  made  her  a  docile  pupil  of  the 
Christian  teachers,  and  before  long  she  committed  herself 
openly  to  their  instruction.  The  prime  minister  was  already 
an  outspoken  supporter  of  the  new  way,  and  together  they 
began  to  Christianize  the  government.  Several  others  of  the 
leading  chiefs  of  both  sexes,  such  as  Kuakini  and  Kapiolani, 
of  Hawaii,  and  Hoapili,  of  Maui,  had  also  taken  the  Christian 
stand.  In  connection  with  the  funeral  ceremonies  for  Lihohho 
a  national  convention  of  chiefs  was  held,  to  affirm  before  the 
representative  of  the  British  government  their  support  of  the 
missionaries,  and  a  strong  pronouncement  was  made  against 
immorality  and  crime.  At  the  same  time  it  was  agreed  that 
the  young  prince,  the  brother  of  the  late  king,  should  be  left 
in  the  care  of  the  missionaries  to  be  trained  for  the  throne, 
the  present  regency  being  continued. 

With  such  royal  favor  and  leadership  the  work  prospered 
and  broadened.    By  the  end  of  1824  not  less  than  fifty  natives 

were  employed  as  teachers  on  the  various  islands, 
the  W   k     ^^^    ^^^^    pupils    had    already    learned    to    read. 

Schools  were  introduced  into  the  new  district  of 
Hilo  and  a  church  built  there,  the  ninth  erected  in  the  first 
four  years  of  the  mission.  When  the  church  at  Honolulu  was 
burned  the  prime  minister  immediately  ordered  timber  to  be 
brought  from  the  mountain  for  another  building.  By  agree- 
ment of  the  chiefs  the  Sabbath  was  formally  recognized  in  the 
land  and  the  ten  commandments  adopted  as  the  basis  of  gov- 
ernment. Laws  were  also  passed  in  the  interests  of  morality 
and  women  were  forbidden  to  visit  the  ships  that  came  to 


64     STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

port.  By  the  following  year  more  than  100  natives  of  both 
sexes,  among  them  several  chiefs  of  royal  blood,  presented 
themselves  at  Honolulu  as  candidates  for  Christian  baptism. 
They  were  all  carefully  examined  and  watched  before  they 
were  admitted  to  the  church,  but  within  a  few  months  most 
of  them  were  received.  A  chief  feature  of  their  Christian 
culture  was  what  they  called  a  ''tabu  meeting,"  in  effect  a 
prayer  meeting  shaped  to  encourage  and  safeguard  morality. 
Separate  associations  of  this  sort  for  men  and  women  were 
formed  in  many  of  the  stations  and  some  of  them  came  to 
have  a  large  membership. 

Notwithstanding  all  these  helps  and  encouragements  there 
were  still  tremendous  obstacles  to  overcome.  Habits  of  indo- 
Against  lence  and  indulgence  were  so  ingrained  in  the  native 
Mighty  life  that  it  furnished  discouraging  material  to  mold 
Odds  into    Christian  character.      Lapses  were    frequent. 

Although  the  people  had  adopted  the  ten  commandments 
as  the  law  of  the  land  they  found  it  hard  to  live  up  to  them. 
The  native  helpers,  even  some  of  those  trained  in  the  United 
States,  often  disappointed  the  missionaries.  One  of  the  Corn- 
wall students,  George,  son  of  the  king  of  Kauai,  upon  his 
father's  death,  in  1824,  actually  led  an  insurrection  against 
the  new  order,  which  threatened  to  bring  on  civil  war,  but 
which  was  fortunately  averted  by  his  defeat  and  subjection. 

Yet  when  one  reahzes  the  situation  in  the  islands  the  wonder 
is  not  so  much  that  many  fell  back  as  that  any  stood  firm. 
The  missionaries  doubted  whether  there  was  ever  a  place  in 
the  world  where  there  was  so  much  concentrated  and  seducing 
wickedness,  with  so  little  restraint  of  conscience,  as  at  the 
station  of  Honolulu.  While  some  captains  of  whaleships  were 
friendly,  and  men  of  Nantucket  are  particularly  mentioned  as 
having  shown  all  kindness  to  the  missionaries  in  their  work, 
even  contributing  generously  to  the  first  house  of  worship, 
the  majority  of  them  were  hostile  and  vicious.  The  pressure 
of  evil  was  tremendous.     Even  one  of  the  missionaries  of  the 


TRANSFORMING  THE  SANDWICH  ISLANDS     65 

first  group  to  arrive,  the  young  physician,  Dr.  Holman,  was 
drawn  away  and  left  the  mission  to  join  its  opponents,  thus 
adding  to  the  strain  and  burden  of  the  rest. 

From  the  beginning  of  the  mission  the  foreigners  who  were 
exploiting  this  weaker  race  objected  to  the  presence  of  the 
Persecu-  missionaries  and  sought  to  hinder  them.  Now  they 
tion  by  undertook  a  more  open  and  vigorous  protest.  The 
Foreigners  gro\vth  of  temperance  sentiment  and  the  laws  to 
protect  womanhood  were  particularly  obnoxious.  False 
charges  and  threats  were  made  by  angry  shipmasters.  The 
most  prolonged  and  worst  outrage  came  from  a  source  that 
was  least  dreaded.  For  the  commander  of  the  Dolphin,  the 
first  United  States  government  ship  to  visit  the  islands,  in 
1826,  demanded  the  repeal  of  the  law  against  the  visiting  of 
ships  by  women,  threatened  to  shoot  Mr.  Bingham  if  he  inter- 
fered, and  to  tear  down  the  houses  of  the  missionaries  unless 
his  demand  was  granted.  After  more  than  a  month  of  parley, 
one  Sabbath  a  half  dozen  sailors  from  the  Dolphin  forced  their 
way  into  the  sick-room  of  the  prime  minister,  where  service 
was  being  held,  renewing  the  demand.  When  Mr.  Bingham 
attempted  to  escape  to  protect  his  house,  the  rioters  set  upon 
him,  and  had  not  the  natives  fought  them  off  would  probably 
have  taken  his  life.  At  length,  by  persistently  terrifying  the 
chiefs,  the  commander  succeeded  in  getting  the  law  revoked, 
and  from  May  to  December  Honolulu  was  shamelessly  defiled. 
The  corruption  which  ensued  was  a  heavy  injury  and  sorrow 
to  the  mission,  but  it  was  comforting  to  see  how  many  of  the 
natives,  not  only  chiefs  but  common  people,  who  had  been 
identified  with  the  missionaries,  held  fast  to  them  despite 
every  slander  and  artifice  of  their  enemies.  The  behavior  of 
these  humble  people  in  dealing  with  powerful  foreigners  and 
in  protecting  their  Christian  teachers  is  one  of  the  glories  of 
missionary  history. 

A  similar  attack  being  made  a  little  later  at  Lahaina  by  the 
crews  of  American  and  British  ships,  and  in  the  absence  of 


66     STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

the  governor,  the  faithful  natives  guarded  Mr.  Richards,  while 
the  governor's  wife,  Hoapiliwahine,  apprehending  the  danger  in 
time,  called  the  women  to  follow  her  to  a  safe  hiding-place  in  the 
mountains.  The  protest  of  the  American  Board  at  these  out- 
rages resulted  in  a  court-martial,  whose  findings,  however,  were 
so  deferred  or  suppressed  that  the  case  was  practically  lost. 

In  spite  of  these  heavy  adversities  and  the  partial  over- 
turning of  the  missionaries'  work,  progress  was  made.  In 
Progress,  1826  a  statement  was  issued  from  the  mission 
Neverthe-  press,  signed  by  eight  missionaries  representing  all 
l®ss  the  stations,  which  set  forth  some  of  the  changes 

that  had  been  wrought  since  their  coming:  that  nearly  all  the 
leading  persons  on  the  islands  had  been  taught  to  read  and 
write;  that  drunkenness  and  gambling,  which  were  formerly 
universal,  were  now  limited  to  a  comparatively  small  number; 
that  the  observing  of  the  Sabbath  was  general;  that  schools 
had  been  established  on  the  principal  islands  and  were  attended 
by  nearly  25,000  scholars,  and  that  some  of  the  leaders  of  the 
nation,  as  well  as  those  of  lower  rank,  had  publicly  committed 
themselves  to  the  faith  and  practise  of  Christianity.  Follow- 
ing this  pronouncement  and  in  accord  with  its  closing  chal- 
lenge, a  remarkable  trial  of  the  missionaries'  case  was  held, 
in  which  Mr.  Richards  spoke  for  them,  and  the  British  consul 
in  opposition,  while  the  captain  of  a  United  States  sloop  of  war, 
then  in  Honolulu,  served  as  judge.  The  case  for  the  opposition 
broke  down,  and  Captain  Jones'  farewell  letter,  expressing  his 
endorsement  of  the  work  of  the  mission,  while  it  did  not  end  per- 
secution or  stop  the  mouths  of  the  angry  seamen,  marked  the 
beginning  of  a  better  attitude  on  the  part  of  the  more  repu- 
table foreigners  and  the  representatives  of  the  United  States. 

Work  now  went  rapidly  on.  Schools  were  everywhere  wel- 
comed; attendance  of  both  young  and  old  was  com- 
th°T?^^d  pulsory.  In  Lahaina,  in  1829,  half  the  population 
was  in  school,  and  at  another  time  the  same  was 
true  of  all  the  islands.     The  weakness  of  these  schools  was  in  the 


TRANSFORMING  THE  SANDWICH   ISLANDS     67 

line  of  their  strength;  for,  as  they  multipHed  fast,  and  pupils 
soon  became  teachers,  they  were  able  to  carry  their  scholars  but 
little  way,  and,  as  they  were  not  often  persistent  in  further 
study,  the  schools  soon  reached  their  zenith  of  interest  and 
power.  Yet  by  contrast  with  their  former  condition  these 
people  seemed  upHfted  "more  than  half  way  to  a  Bacon  or  a 
Newton." 

The  work  of  translation  and  publishing  kept  pace  with  that 
of  the  schools.  As  the  number  of  those  who  could  read  in- 
creased, the  demand  for  books  grew  also.  In  the  first  eight 
years  of  the  mission's  history  twenty-two  books  were  printed, 
of  which  387,000  copies  were  distributed,  besides  many  books 
and  papers  brought  from  the  United  States.  The  translation 
of  the  Scriptures  by  Mr.  Richards  and  Mr.  Bingham  was  pur- 
sued and  portions  appeared  from  time  to  time  as  they  were 
ready.  By  1828  the  four  Gospels  had  been  translated  and 
were  in  circulation. 

The  acquisition  of  a  small  packet  in  1827  encouraged  touring 
among  the  islands,  which  in  native  boats  had  been  desperately 
slow  and  uncomfortable  work.  Several  tours  of  exploration 
and  preaching  were  made  from  1826  to  1828;  with  delight  it  was 
found  that  schools  had  in  many  cases  preceded  the  mission- 
ary. The  tours  themselves  sometimes  became  training-schools, 
people  crowding  around  their  visitors  with  note-books  to  take 
down  and  commit  all  they  were  taught. 

A  deepening  seriousness  among  the  islanders  was  shown  by 
increased  attendance  at  religious  services  and  a  growing  relig- 
First  ious  sense,  which  if   somewhat   superficial   seemed 

Awaken-  in  the  main  honest.  Mr.  Richards  on  Maui  reported 
ing,  1828  ^iiat  there  was  scarcely  an  hour  in  the  day  when  he 
did  not  have  inquirers.  In  Hawaii,  too,  and  Oahu  groups 
were  waiting  at  the  missionary's  gate  in  the  morning;  as  they 
were  received,  others  took  their  place.  At  Kailua  the  church 
was  often  filled  to  overflowing,  the  canoes  drawn  up  on  the 
beach,  at  the  time  of  the  service,  making  the  missionaries  think 


68  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

of  the  row  of  carriages  drawn  up  by  the  country  church  in 
the  homeland.  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Ruggles  had  names  of  2500 
inquirers  on  their  books.  The  characteristics  of  this  awaken- 
ing were  hke  those  famihar  in  more  civiUzed  lands:  a  sense  of 
sin,  the  impulse  to  repentance,  the  joy  of  faith,  the  fellowship 
and  zeal  of  the  new  communion. 

Those  were  happy  and  inspiring  clays  to  the  missionaries 
who  had  labored  long  and  hard.  They  did  not  overestimate 
the  event;  they  knew  well  the  instability  of  the  native  char- 
acter and  they  were  prepared  for  some  reaction.  Yet,  when 
in  the  report  for  1832  the  question  was  raised,  ''Are  the  Sand- 
wich Islanders  a  Christian  nation?"  they  could  only  answer 
affirmatively.  By  all  the  rules  usually  applied,  these  people 
had  grown  within  twelve  years  to  be  a  Christian  people.  Chris- 
tianity had  preceded  civilization  and  was  leading  it.  So  strong 
an  impression  did  this  argument  make  that  it  was  seriously 
proposed  that  further  missionary  efforts  should  be  confined 
to  the  less  known  islands.  A  new  mission  to  the  Washington 
or  Marquesas  Islands  was  therefore  undertaken  in  1833,  but 
the  attempt  to  reach  the  savage  and  polluted  cannibals  of 
that  group  was  soon  abandoned  as  untimely. 

The  death  of  Kaahamanu,  the  queen  regent,  in  1832,  was 
accompanied  by  a  general  decline  in  the  better  hfe  of  the 
A  Decline  islands.  This  remarkable  woman  had  proved  her- 
in  Religion  self  a  pillar  of  strength  to  the  Christian  influences 
and  Morals  j^  her  land.  Naturally  proud,  high-spirited,  and 
loving  power,  in  heathen  days  she  had  been  an  imperious  and 
often  cruel  ruler.  Her  unusual  keenness  of  mind,  energy,  and 
resoluteness  of  will  had  made  her  since  the  death  of  her  husband, 
the  great  Kamehameha,  a  figure  of  supreme  importance  in  the 
land.  During  the  decade  since  the  death  of  Liholiho  she  had 
ruled  with  a  firm  and  wise  hand.  In  the  early  years  her  people 
feared  while  they  respected  her.  As  she  came  more  under  the 
influence  of  the  missionaries  and  was  softened  by  sickness  and 
the  responsibilities  of  office,  her  character  was  radically  changed. 


TRANSFORMING  THE  SANDWICH  ISLANDS     69 

In  her  later  years,  during  her  tours  through  the  islands,  so 
impressed  were  the  people  by  the  sincerity  of  her  Christian 
life  and  her  sympathy  for  them  that  they  called  her  ''the  new 
Kaahumanu."  During  her  regency  this  little  nation  in  the 
South  Seas  was  perhaps  as  near  to  a  theocracy  as  any  people 
since  the  early  days  of  Israel.  Her  death  following  that  of 
the  prime  minister  left  the  rule  to  less  competent  and  devoted 
hands.  The  crown  prince,  on  coming  into  power,  so  inclined 
toward  evil  advisers  and  relaxed  the  government  that  wide- 
spread demoralization  and  disorder  ensued.  At  the  time  it 
seemed  a  dark  providence  that  thus  allowed  the  weakening 
of  royal  support  to  the  cause  of  the  missionaries.  Later  it 
was  judged  not  to  be  without  advantage  that  the  alliance 
between  church  and  state  should  have  been  parted,  in  view  of 
the  danger  of  the  church  being  perverted  to  the  ends  of  evil 
and  unscrupulous  rulers.  The  unhappy  effects  of  the  change 
were  widely  felt  in  the  falling  off  of  schools  and  congregations, 
the  desecration  of  the  Sabbath,  and  the  loss  of  devotion  on 
the  part  of  church  members.  From  the  missionary  stand- 
point, in  1834,  the  outlook  was  dark  indeed. 

The  progress  of  the  mission  was  thus  clouded  for   only  a 
little   while.     The   American    Board  was   persuaded   that   in 

this  field,  with  forces  so  well  in  hand,  it  should  be 
gg    .  possible  to  demonstrate  the  power  of  the  gospel  to 

evangelize  in  one  age  an  entire  people.  With  this 
end  in  view,  the  missionaries  were  called  upon  to  survey  their 
fields  again  and  to  estimate  their  needs.  In  1836  there  went 
to  the  islands  the  largest  number  of  missionaries  ever  sent  out 
at  one  time  to  any  mission,  thirty-two  men  and  women.  Many 
of  this  party  were  not  ordained,  but  were  secured  as  lay  helpers 
to  aid  in  a  more  rapid  effort  to  evangelize  the  field.  By  1837 
the  forces  of  the  mission  had  been  so  enlarged  that  there  were 
seventeen  stations  occupied,  with  seventeen  churches  and 
twenty-seven  ordained  missionaries,  the  total  missionary  force 
numbering  sixty. 


70  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

All  forms  of  mission  work  were  now  pressed  with  fresh 
determination.  The  revival  and  improvement  of  schools  was 
being  accomplished  through  the  development  of  higher  insti- 
tutions; the  graduates  of  the  seminary  at  Lahainaluna  and 
the  other  mission  schools  were  going  forth  better  equipped 
for  the  work  of  teaching.  The  boarding-schools  on  several  of 
the  islands  were  getting  well  under  way  —  one  for  boys  at 
Hilo,  and  another  for  girls,  the  latter  opened  by  Mrs.  Coan 
upon  her  arrival,  and  a  larger  school  for  girls  on  Maui  —  so 
that  the  proportion  of  youth  under  instruction  was  now  far 
greater  than  in  former  times.  But  the  schools  for  adults 
shared  in  the  general  revival  of  learning,  and  better  houses 
and  equipment  were  secured. 

In  the  same  way  new  houses  of  worship  were  erected,  many 
of  them  substantial  buildings  of  stone;  one  at  Kaulua  glorying 
in  a  gallery,  steeple,  and  bell.  New  lines  of  industry  were 
being  introduced  and  a  marked  improvement  in  thrift  and 
personal  appearance  was  manifest  among  the  people.  The 
missionaries  began  to  hope  that  the  idle  habits  of  the  race 
might  be  overcome.  In  the  interior  districts  the  conditions 
were  still  bare  and  hard.  In  one  part  of  Hawaii  it  was  reported 
that  there  were  not  forty  families  in  the  church  whose  entire 
wardrobe  and  household  furniture  would  be  worth  more  than 
$20.  A  canoe,  a  hog  or  two,  a  grass  house,  a  few  mats  and 
calabashes,  a  shirt  apiece  and  one  pair  of  trousers  for  the 
men,  one  dress  for  each  woman,  rarely  an  ax,  more  often  a 
fish-net,  made  up  the  inventory  of  property  belonging  to  most 
of  the  families  on  that  island. 

However,  better  conditions  were  coming  to  pass.  For  in 
1839  the  old  order  which  had  made  the  people  virtually  slaves 
The  New  o^  their  rulers  was  superseded  by  a  code  of  laws, 
Code  of  proclaimed  by  the  king  and  his  counselors,  which 
Laws,  1839  gave  to  every  man  a  true  bill  of  rights  to  himself 
and  his  family,  to  land  which  he  acquired,  and  to  the  avails 
of  his  own  skill  and  industry.      Real  progress  on  a  basis  of 


TRANSFORMING  THE  SANDWICH  ISLANDS     71 

liberty  and  law  was  now  possible.  Where  else  in  this  old 
world  than  in  these  islands  just  out  of  savagery  was  a  hered- 
itary despotism  ever  changed  to  a  constitutional  government 
by  the  voluntary  action  of  those  in  power? 

The  coming  of  the  Coans  to  Hilo  in  1835  marked  a  new 
era  at  that  station.  During  the  first  half  year  of  his  mis- 
sionary life  and  before  he  could  use  the  language, 

jj..  Mr.  Coan  had  begun  his  famous  tours  of  the  district. 

His  splendid  physique  enabled  him  to  undertake 
such  journeys  as  would  appall  most  men.  On  one  trip  he 
crossed  sixty-three  ravines,  one-fourth  of  which  were  from  200 
to  1000  feet  deep.  It  was  often  a  matter  of  climbing  with 
both  hands  and  feet,  over  perilous  places,  sometimes  of  being 
let  down  by  ropes  from  tree  to  tree,  or  being  carried  on  the 
shoulders  of  a  native  while  a  company  of  men  with  locked 
hands  stretched  themselves  across  the  torrent  to  prevent  the 
danger  of  being  carried  over  the  falls.  As  each  village  was 
reached  there  was  plenty  of  missionary  work  to  be  done,  the 
weekly  number  of  sermons  being  never  less  than  six  or  seven 
and  sometimes  as  many  as  twenty-five  or  thirty. 

The  value  of  this  touring  was  apparent  as  the  people  flocked 
in  to  Hilo  to  hear  more  of  the  gospel.  During  the  years  1837-38 
Hilo  was  crowded  with  strangers;  the  cabins  of  the  visitors 
studded  the  plain  like  the  camp  of  an  army.  Entire  families 
would  come  in  together,  the  aged  being  brought  on  litters, 
until  whole  villages  in  the  country  were  left  practically  deserted. 
By  fishing  and  planting  taro  and  potatoes,  this  great  company  was 
able  to  maintain  itself  and  found  time  to  crowd  the  services  in  the 
great  house  of  worship.  It  was  a  moving  sight  to  the  mission- 
ary to  look  down  upon  the  sea  of  faces  waiting  for  the  Word. 

So  in  Hilo  and  in  like  manner  elsewhere  came  gradually  and 
quietly  a  religious  awakening  that  soon  shook  the  land. 
The  Great  Beginning  in  1836,  it  reached  its  climax  in  1838-39. 
Awaken-  The  missionaries  at  that  time  were  burdened  with 
ing,  1838-39  special  longing  for  the  conversion  of  the  whole  world. 
They  had  sent  a  printed  appeal  to  the  churches  in  the  home- 


72     STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

land  to  join  them  in  prayer  and  effort  for  this  end.  It 
reached  the  United  States  in  the  year  1837,  in  the  midst  of 
the  financial  panic,  a  time  not  favorable  for  appeals  for  more 
consecration  or  the  expenditure  of  more  money.  Though  dis- 
appointed at  the  reception  of  their  message,  the  missionaries 
kept  on  praying  until  their  reward  came  in  the  unmistakable 
signs  of  a  rehgious  awakening  in  their  own  field.  A  new 
spiritual  life  stirred  in  the  native  churches;  the  standard  of 
piety  was  raised;  inquirers  and  then  converts  began  to  appear. 
There  was  a  new  eagerness  to  hear  the  preaching  of  the  gospel. 
The  themes  were  its  old  familiar  call  to  repentance  and  faith, 
and  its  appeal  to  the  will.  The  response  became  tremendous. 
Some  starthng  demonstrations  occurred,  requiring  restraint, 
but  in  the  main  there  was  little  tumult  and  hysteria,  but 
much  heart  searching,  confession,  and  earnest  seeking  after 
God.  Congregations  increased  until  in  some  stations  2000, 
sometimes  even  4000  or  5000  people  assembled.  The  num- 
bers won  to  the  Christian  life  were  beyond  all  precedent. 
During  the  years  1839-41  the  accessions  to  the  eighteen  churches 
were  22,297,  and  this  with  the  greatest  care  in  sifting  candi- 
dates. Careful  lists  of  converts  were  kept;  they  were  assigned, 
visited,  examined,  and  reexamined,  enrolled  in  training  classes, 
put  on  probation,  and  then  held  back  for  months  and  even 
years  before  they  were  admitted.  Friends  and  enemies  alike 
were  called  upon  to  testify  concerning  the  candidates.  Instead 
of  a  lack  of  caution,  it  was  afterward  thought  that  there  had 
been  an  excess  of  caution  in  admitting  new  members. 

Of  course  there  were  relapses  and,  in  some  places  and  to 
an  extent,  reaction.  Yet  this  great  awakening  Christian- 
ized the  nation.  It  changed  the  outer  as  well  as  the  inner 
hfe.  That  it  did  not  develop  Christian  character  to  an  even 
greater  degree  was  perhaps  due  in  part  to  the  missionaries' 
reluctance  to  put  much  responsibility  upon  the  young  dis- 
ciples; so  they  failed  to  evoke  a  life  and  service  corresponding 
to  the  new  devotion. 


TRANSFORMING  THE  SANDWICH  ISLANDS      73 

The  distinguished  traveler,  Miss  Isabella  Bird,  in  an  account 
of  her  visit  to  Hilo  and  the  acquaintance  there  made  with 
Mr.  Coan,  relates,  as  she  heard  it  from  him,  the  story  of  the 
revival,  and,  in  particular,  of  that  first  Sunday  in  July,  1838, 
when  he  baptized  1705  persons.  The  candidates  were  seated 
close  together  in  rows,  while  Mr.  Lyman  and  Mr.  Coan,  passing 
between,  sprinkled  every  bowed  head  and  then  pronounced 
the  formula  for  baptism.  Afterward  2400  converts  received 
the  Holy  Communion.  Mr.  Coan's  own  words  picture  that 
service:  ''The  old  and  decrepit,  the  lame,  the  blind,  the  maimed, 
the  withered,  the  paralytic,  and  those  aflflicted  with  divers 
diseases  and  torments;  those  with  eyes,  noses,  lips,  and  limbs 
consumed;  with  features  distorted,  and  figures  depraved  and 
loathsome;  these  came  hobbhng  upon  their  staves,  or  led  and 
borne  by  others  to  the  table  of  the  Lord.  Among  the  throng 
you  would  have  seen  the  hoary  priest  of  idolatry,  with  hands 
but  recently  washed  from  the  blood  of  human  victims,  together 
with  thieves,  adulterers,  highway  robbers,  murderers,  and 
mothers  whose  hands  reeked  with  the  blood  of  their  own 
children.  It  seemed  like  one  of  the  crowds  the  Saviour  gath- 
ered, and  over  which  he  pronounced  the  words  of  healing." 

Almost  from  the  beginning  the  missionaries  had  been  encour- 
aged and  helped  at  their  task  by  converts  of  rank  and  influence. 
Eminent  Some  of  them  have  been  already  mentioned:  Queen 
Converts  Keopuolani,  the  subject  king  of  Kauai,  the  regent 
Kaahumanu,  and  her  prime  minister,  Kalanimoku,  whose 
conversion  overcame  the  pride,  ambition,  and  baser  vices 
of  a  strong  savage  and  produced  a  true  servant  and  bene- 
factor of  his  nation. 

A  favorite  heroine  of  the  Christian  conquest  of  the  Sandwich 
Islands  was  Kapiolani,  a  descendant  of  one  of  the  ancient 
Hawaiian  kings,  whose  landed  possessions  sloped  back  from 
the  waters  of  Kealakekua  Bay  to  the  woodlands  of  Mauna 
Loa.  When  she  first  came  into  contact  with  the  missionaries, 
like  the  rest  of  her  people,  she  was  ignorant  and  intemperate, 


74     STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

and  as  was  customary  among  women  of  her  rank,  the  wife  of 
two  husbands  —  a  pagan  in  every  sense  of  the  word.  Soon 
she  became  a  devoted  behever  in  the  gospel  and  set  about 
conforming  her  hfe  thereto.  She  renounced  all  gambling  and 
drinking,  gave  up  her  younger  husband,  with  her  own  hands 
destroyed  idols,  founded  schools,  ministered  to  the  sick,  and 
went  about  her  province  doing  good.  In  her  well-ordered 
home  she  entertained  graciously,  and  even  with  the  niceties 
of  civilized  life,  not  only  her  missionary  friends,  but  distin- 
guished visitors  from  other  lands. 

The  one  act  which  makes  her  name  immortal  is  her  visit 
in  1825  to  Pele,  the  great  crater  of  Kilauea.  ReaHzing  the 
superstition  with  which  her  people  regarded  this  smoking 
mountain,  while  they  worshiped  with  sacrifices  the  reputed  god- 
dess supposed  to  dwell  within  its  seething  abyss,  this  high  chief 
resolved  to  visit  the  volcano,  defy  the  goddess  and  break  her 
spell.  Her  husband  and  her  people  besought  her  not  to  pro- 
ceed. Her  answer  was,  ''If  I  am  destroyed,  you  may  all 
believe  in  Pele;  but  if  I  am  not,  then  you  must  all  turn  to  the 
palapalaJ'  When  a  prophetess  of  Pele  stood  in  her  path  and 
warned  her  not  to  go  further,  she  confounded  the  impostor  by 
demanding  proof  of  her  prophetic  gift.  After  the  babble  of 
unmeaning  sounds  was  over,  Kapiolani  began  to  read  from 
the  Scriptures  a  message  from  the  true  God  until  the  sup- 
posed prophetess  was  silenced. 

On  reaching  the  crater  she  marched  straight  to  the  brink, 
ate  of  the  berries  consecrated  to  Pele,  threw  stones  of  defiance 
into  the  boiling  mass,  and  challenged  the  weeping  natives  who 
had  followed  her  to  acknowledge  Jehovah.  Then  with  words 
of  hymn  and  prayer  the  whole  company  worshiped  the  living 
God.  The  enlightened  traveler  who  gazes  upon  the  awful 
majesty  of  this  volcano  is  silenced  into  half  fear  by  the  spec- 
tacle, yet  this  woman,  scarcely  four  years  out  of  paganism, 
stood  forth  superior  to  the  horror  of  the  place  and  the  terror  of 
her  people  and  by  one  act  broke  the  fetters  of  superstition. 


TRANSFORMING  THE  SANDWICH  ISLANDS     75 

Not  all  the  witness  was  borne  by  those  of  high  rank.  Puaaiki 
was  a  bhnd  dancer  and  buffoon  in  the  king's  train  when  the 

missionaries  came  to  Hawaii.  Only  thirty-five 
g    ,.  years  of  age,  he  had  almost  burned  his  hfe  out  with 

gross  vices.  A  pitiable  figure  of  small  frame,  with 
haggard  face,  feeble  limbs,  half-clad  and  underfed,  when  in  a 
fit  of  sickness  he  received  some  kindness  from  one  of  the  Chris- 
tian islanders  brought  from  America,  the  king's  fool  was  won 
to  the  life  of  a  child  of  God.  He  began  to  come  regularly 
to  worship,  gave  up  his  drink,  and  sought  eagerly  to  learn 
the  new  way.  His  blindness  shut  him  in  to  store  in  his 
powerful  memory  the  words  and  ideas  that  came  to  him. 
At  length  Puaaiki,  or  Bartimeus,  as  he  was  called  upon  his 
admission  to  the  Church,  became  known  as  a  remarkable 
preacher.  During  the  awakening  of  1838  his  heart  was  over- 
flowing with  joy,  and  his  words  were  as  of  one  lifted  up  by 
the  power  of  the  Spirit,  while  his  face  shone  as  if  it  reflected 
some  of  the  glory  of  heaven.  His  preltching  was  a  wonder 
and  delight  to  the  missionaries,  while  his  humility,  gentleness, 
and  loving  zeal  endeared  him  to  all. 

The  joyful  scenes  of  the  great  awakening  were  rudely  broken 
by  the  arrival  of  a  French  corvette  Embuscade,  whose  captain 
Political  announced  that  he  had  come  to  further  the  interests 
Disturb-  of  the  Roman  Catholics  in  the  islands.  This  was 
ances,  not  the  first  attempt  of  the  sort;  Roman  ecclesias- 

^^42  ^ics  had  early  tried  to  get  a  foothold  in  the  islands, 

but  were  driven  out  by  the  king.  In  1839  a  French  frigate 
arrived,  whose  officer  claimed  that  France  had  been  insulted 
by  the  rejection  of  the  Jesuits  and  who  demanded  reparation 
and  a  new  treaty  showing  favor  to  them.  Issuing  his  ulti- 
matum, he  threatened  hostilities  if  prompt  reply  were  not 
received.  Under  such  stress  the  king  yielded,  the  treaty  was 
signed,  indemnity  paid,  and  the  frigate  sailed  away  with  the 
desired  concessions  to  the  cause  of  French  Catholics  and  French 
brandy. 


76     STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

Now  in  1842  the  demand  was  even  more  curt  and  insulting. 
The  king  made  calm  reply  that  representatives  were  already 
on  the  way  to  France  to  arrange  a  new  treaty.  So  critical 
was  the  state  of  affairs  that  an  embassy,  of  which  Mr.  Richards 
was  one  member,  was  sent  to  Europe  and  to  the  United  States 
with  the  request  that  the  independence  of  the  Sandwich  Islands 
be  acknowledged,  with  guarantee  against  usurpation.  During 
the  absence  of  the  embassy,  affairs  were  brought  into  still 
further  tumult  by  the  high-handed  action  of  an  English  com- 
mander, who  forced  a  cession  of  the  islands  to  Great  Britain 
in  February,  1843. 

This  seizure  was  short-lived,  but  during  the  months  until 
relief  came  the  situation  was  deplorable,  with  law  and  order 
relaxed  and  a  carnival  of  lust  and  intemperance  recalHng  the 
early  days  of  the  mission.  The  king  in  despair  gave  up  the 
attempt  to  rule  and  retired  to  Maui.  Dr.  Judd,  acting  in 
Mr.  Richards'  absence  as  recorder  for  the  government,  ren- 
dered great  service  bj^his  bold  and  ingenious  act  of  hiding  the 
national  records  in  the  royal  tomb.  In  that  unsuspected  spot, 
using  Kaahumanu's  coffin  for  a  table,  he  made  his  office  for 
several  weeks,  working  quietly  for  the  welfare  of  the  country. 
The  arrival  of  both  United  States  and  British  warships  rein- 
stated the  king  and  restored  order,  and  on  July  31  the  king 
and  chief  repaired  to  the  great  Stone  Church  at  Honolulu  to 
give  thanks  to  God  for  their  deliverance.  Soon  afterward  the 
independence  of  the  Hawaiian  nation  was  formally  acknowl- 
edged. Thus  in  a  quarter  of  a  century  had  come  forth  from 
the  depth  of  savagery  a  civilized  nation,  an  event  unmatched 
in  the  history  of  the  world. 

The  decade  following  the  great  awakening  was  character- 
ized by  fluctuations  of  hope  and  discouragement  in  the  work 
A  Spiral  of  the  mission.  Sometimes  two  missionaries  writing 
Progress,  at  the  same  time  told  quite  different  stories.  There 
1840-1850  T^QYe  always  two  sides  to  be  observed.  The  Sand- 
wich Islander  was  still  a  difficult  problem;  even  when  he  became 


TRANSFORMING  THE  SANDWICH  ISLANDS      77 

a  Christian  much  of  his  old  unstable  and  evasive  nature  clung 
to  him.  There  was  a  deal  to  lament  in  his  course;  it  was  good 
that  he  still  struggled  on.  The  period  of  public  disorder  and 
poUtical  agitation  was  not  conducive  to  missionary  work,  and 
the  growing  intercourse  with  the  civihzed  world,  while  it 
brought  advantages  and  new  Hfe  to  the  islands,  brought  also 
new  temptations  and  actually  tended  to  lower  the  moral  tone 
of  the  community. 

Yet  on  the  whole  signs  of  progress  were  manifest  in  almost 
every  direction.  The  social  condition  of  the  people  was 
brighter;  the  islands  became  prosperous.  With  the  rush  to 
California,  upon  the  discovery  of  gold,  there  came  new  markets 
both  for  the  labor  and  products  of  the  islands.  The  indus- 
trious could  now  acquire  property  and  better  homes  and  farms 
began  to  appear.  The  higher  schools  had  become  important 
forces  in  the  nation's  life.  In  the  schools  for  girls,  the  sem- 
inary at  Lahainaluna  and  Oahu  College  some  of  the  ablest 
missionaries  were  devoting  their  labors  to  training  native 
leaders  and  teachers.  A  school  instituted  in  1839  for  young 
chiefs  was  soon  supported  by  the  government,  and  had  four- 
teen students,  two  of  whom  have  since  reigned  as  king  and 
one  as  queen. 

The  organization  of  a  national  temperance  society,  the 
systematic  cultivation  of  temperance  sentiment  through  the 
schools,  and,  in  particular,  the  signing  of  a  total  abstinence 
pledge  in  1842  by  the  king  and  thirteen  of  his  chiefs,  brought 
a  glorious  change  in  one  characteristic  of  life  in  the  islands. 
It  cut  off  in  a  day  nine-tenths  of  the  power  which  some  unprin- 
cipled foreigners  had  before  possessed  over  the  king  and  the 
kingdom. 

The  watch  and  care  of  the  missionaries  for  the  native 
Christians  was  no  formal  matter;  they  regarded  their  converts 
with  the  same  spirit  of  love  and  yearning  which  Paul  felt  in 
his  day.  When  the  young  men  went  to  sea  their  teachers 
watched  for  their  return,  and  inquired  whether  they  had  fallen 


78  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

into  the  way  of  drink  or  violated  other  rules  of  morality,  and, 
in  particular,  whether  they  had  chased  whales  on  the  Lord's 
Day.  When  fifteen  went  from  the  Lahaina  church  in  1850 
to  dig  for  gold  in  California,  Dr.  Baldwin  reported  with  delight 
that  not  one  was  known  to  have  dishonored  his  profession. 

In  more  directly  religious  lines  progress  was  also  apparent. 
The  translation  of  the  Bible  into  Hawaiian  speech  was  com- 
pleted in  February,  1839,  less  than  twenty  years  after  the 
arrival  of  the  first  missionaries,  and  gave  a  new  impetus  to 
the  circulation  of  the  Scriptures. 

Larger  things  were  now  undertaken  in  the  way  of  native 
contributions.  The  people  had  always  been  generous  accord- 
A  Self-  ing  to  their  ability.  In  the  earher  days,  when  they 
Reliant  had  no  money  they  gave  their  labor.  The  people 
Church  of  Hilo  brought  in  weekly  supplies  of  food  for  the 
girls'  school,  at  length  setting  apart  a  parcel  of  ground  and 
appointing  each  '' monthly  concert"  day  as  a  time  to  cultivate 
it  as  the  school  garden.  In  the  same  way  they  toiled  to  build 
their  churches,  often  bringing  timber  for  miles  over  country 
so  rough  that  only  one  stick  could  be  brought  in  a  day  by 
the  company  of  from  forty  to  eighty  persons.  The  new 
church  at  Honolulu,  in  1842,  was  built  of  stone  brought 
from  heathen  temples,  lime  made  from  coral,  obtained  by 
diving  to  the  bottom  of  the  sea  and  then  carried  seven 
miles,  and  timbers  drawn  from  the  mountain  forests.  Mr. 
Coan's  account  of  the  drawing  of  lumber  for  the  first 
frame  church  in  Hilo,  in  1840,  gives  a  vivid  picture  of 
one  of  these  building  bees:  ''When  a  large  number  of  pieces 
were  ready,  hundreds  of  willing  men  and  women,  provided 
with  ropes  made  of  the  bark  of  the  hibiscus,  with  light  upper 
garments,  and  with  leggings  of  the  Adam  and  Eve  style,  such 
as  never  feared  mud  and  water,  went  to  bring  down  these 
timbers.  Arranged  by  a  captain  in  two  lines,  with  drag 
ropes  in  hand,  ready  to  obey  the  command  of  their  chosen 
leader,  they  stood  waiting  his  order.     At  length  comes  the 


TRANSFORMING  THE  SANDWICH  ISLANDS     79 

command,  'Grasp  the  ropes;  bow  the  head;  bUster  the  hand; 
go;  sweat!'  And  away  they  rush,  through  mud  and  jungle, 
over  rocks  and  streams,  shouting  merrily,  and  singing  to 
measure.  Then  comes  the  order,  'Halt,  drop,  drag  ropes, 
rest!'  This  is  repeated  at  longer  or  shorter  intervals  accord- 
ing to  the  state  of  the  ground." 

Self-support  began  to  be  considered  by  1840,  when  Mr. 
Richards  proposed  that  the  native  churches  should  reUeve 
the  American  Board  of  a  part  of  the  burden  of  their  main- 
tenance. The  idea  gained  headway  slowly  until  the  church 
at  Wailuku  reported  to  Mr.  Clark  that  they  were  ready  to 
support  their  own  institution.  By  1850  it  was  seriously  con- 
sidered that  the  time  had  come  for  closing  the  mission.  The 
large  company  of  missionaries  and  their  families  was  now  a 
heavy  financial  burden,  while  the  missions  in  other  lands  were 
so  urgently  calling  for  enlargement  that  it  was  felt  the 
Sandwich  Islands  should  speedily  provide  for  their  own  needs. 
When  terms  of  closing  began  to  be  discussed,  opinions  differed 
as  to  whether  more  responsibility  could  be  placed  upon  the 
native  churches.  The  mission  had  been  slow  to  develop  in 
this  direction,  many  of  the  missionaries  thinking  that  the 
peculiar  characteristics  of  the  Sandwich  Islanders  were  unfavor- 
able to  their  assuming  any  responsibility.  The  carrying  out 
of  the  proposals  was  thus  delayed  for  another  decade. 

The  suggestion  that  the  Sandwich  Islanders  should  them- 
selves maintain  a  mission  in  Micronesia  was  just  beginning 
to  be  heard  as  this  period  closes,  and  was  itself  the  best  evi- 
dence of  the  progress  made.  What  the  missionary  accom- 
plishment had  been  in  these  islands  in  less  than  a  generation 
is  emphasized  by  the  testimony  of  the  American  consul  at 
Honolulu  in  1848.  After  confessing  that  in  the  United  States 
he  had  been  opposed  to  missionary  effort,  he  declared,  "I  do 
not  believe  that  another  instance  can  be  found  where,  with 
the  same  amount  of  means,  so  much  good  has  been  done  to 
any  people  in  so  limited  a  period." 


Chapter  V 
REENTERING  BIBLE  LANDS 

Upon  William  Goodell's  visit  to  the  Choctaw  Indians  in 
1821  he  was  welcomed  with  special  interest  as  ''expecting 
one  day  to  preach  the  gospel  at  Jerusalem."  From 
p  ,  the  beginning  the  American  Board  had  its  eye  on 
the  Holy  Land.  It  seemed  intolerable  to  its  found- 
ers that  Christianity's  birthplace  should  be  forever  in  the 
grip  of  Islam,  or  left  to  exhibit  a  form  of  Christianity,  ancient 
and  intrenched,  but  for  the  most  part  lifeless. 

The  first  attempts  at  missionary  work  were  not  directed 
particularly  toward  the  Mohammedans  nor  to  the  Oriental 
Churches,  but  to  the  Jews,  as  in  November,  1819,  Pliny  Fiske 
and  Levi  Parsons  were  sent  out  to  labor  in  Palestine,  with 
their  anticipated  location  at  Jerusalem.  However,  their 
instructions  gave  them  ample  range.  From  the  heights  of 
Zion  they  were  to  survey,  not  only  the  Holy  Land,  but  sur- 
rounding countries,  and  then  to  put  to  themselves  two  main 
questions:  ''What  good  can  be  done?"  and  "By  what  means?" 
"What  can  be  done  for  the  Jews?  What  for  pagans?  What 
for  Mohammedans?  What  for  Christians?  What  for  the 
people  in  Palestine?  What  for  those  in  Egypt,  in  Syria,  in 
Persia,  in  Armenia,  in  other  countries  to  which  your  inquiries 
may  be  extended?" 

The  view  before  these  pioneers  was  a  challenge  for  the 
stoutest  heart.  The  vast  Turkish  empire,  with  2,000,000 
The  Land  square  miles  of  territory,  then  covered  almost  every 
to  be  Pos-  land  named  in  Bible  history.  Beyond  Palestine 
sessed  ^^d  Syria  to  the  north  and  west  lay  the  great  table- 

lands of  Asia  Minor,  which  Paul  traversed  as  he  followed  the 
highways  of  the  Roman  provinces.     To  the  east  and  south 

80 


REENTERING  BIBLE  LANDS  81 

stretched  the  wild  deserts  of  Arabia;  and  northward,  again, 
Mesopotamia  and  Assyria  to  the  Persian  border.  On  the 
southern  shore  of  the  Mediterranean  were  Egypt  and  the 
African  provinces;  on  the  northern  side,  Greece  and  the  Balkan 
provinces,  then  a  constituent  part  of  the  empire. 

And  in  this  vast  territory  dwelt  a  strange  medley  of  races 
and  religions.  There  were  the  Mohammedans,  first  of  all 
Turks,  the  dominant  race  in  the  land,  but  including  also  Arabs 
of  Syria,  Arabia,  and  Africa,  Kurds  of  Mesopotamia  and 
Armenia,  Druzes  of  the  Lebanon,  and  a  majority  of  the 
Albanians  in  European  Turkey.  Over  against  these  Moham- 
medan and  semi-pagan  peoples,  disagreeing  among  themselves, 
were  a  variety  of  Christian  sects,  of  which  the  Armenians 
were  the  most  numerous  and  potent.  Other  Christians  in 
this  huge  body  poHtic  were  the  Greeks,  found  in  European 
Turkey  and  in  western  Asia  Minor,  the  Nestorians  in  the 
plains  and  mountains  between  Assyria  and  Persia,  and  the 
Jacobites,  Maronites,  and  lesser  cults  of  Syria  and  the  region 
thereabout.  In  Palestine,  and  more  or  less  all  over  the  empire, 
in  Europe  as  in  Asia,  were  the  Jews. 

Here  were  40,000,000  people  crowded  together  and  yet 
separated  by  irreconcilable  differences  of  race  and  religion, 
and  embittered  by  years  of  controversy  and  warfare.  Except 
in  the  coast  cities  there  were  scarcely  any  educated  men;  the 
women  were  uniformly  illiterate.  There  was  no  Hterature, 
apparently  no  desire  for  it;  everywhere  a  stagnant  barbarism, 
under  the  oppressive  hand  of  the  sultan-caliph  at  Constan- 
tinople. From  one  end  of  the  empire  to  the  other  there  was 
not  a  missionary  station  permanently  occupied,  not  even  an 
estabhshed  missionary  to  whom  these  pioneers  could  go  for 
counsel  or  with  whom  they  could  divide  the  land. 

Making  Smyrna  their  temporary  base,  Messrs.  Fiske  and  Par- 
Spying  it  sons  began  their  language  studies.  At  length,  after 
Out,  1820  a  tour  through  Asia  Minor  visiting  the  seats  of  the 
seven  churches   and    consulting   as  to   the  best    methods   of 


82     STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

approach,  they  decided  that  Parsons  should  go  at  once 
to  Jerusalem,  where  in  1821  he  took  up  his  residence  near 
the  Holy  Sepulchre,  attempting  particularly  to  reach  the 
multitudes  of  pilgrims  coming  to  the  city.  But  Jerusalem  was 
not  a  hospitable  place  for  a  mission  station.  The  outbreak 
of  the  Greek  revolution  presently  compelled  a  retreat  to  Smyrna. 
Attempting  to  return  to  Jerusalem  the  next  year,  Parsons  died 
on  the  way  at  Alexandria.  His  place  was  promptly  taken 
by  Rev.  Jonas  King,  who  gave  up  a  prospective  professorship 
at  Amherst  College  for  temporary  service  in  the  emergency. 
Upon  his  joining  Mr.  Fiske  at  Malta,  a  caravan  of  seventy- 
four  persons,  Arabs,  Turks,  Greeks,  and  Armenians,  under  the 
lead  of  these  two  missionaries,  set  out  for  Jerusalem  by  way 
of  Alexandria,  Cairo,  and  the  desert,  distributing  Bibles  and 
tracts  at.  villages  along  the  Nile. 

Two  busy  years  were  spent  in  the  endeavor  to  get  a  foot- 
hold in  Jerusalem.  Tours  through  Syria  and  Palestine 
promoted  acquaintance  with  the  land  and  with  its  people. 
Careful  inquiries  and  observations  were  made,  to  be  set  down 
in  journals  and  reported  to  officers  of  the  Board,  as  to  the  pros- 
pects of  a  Palestine  mission  and  the  claims  of  different  loca- 
tions. Such  centers  were  visited  as  Jaffa,  Beirut,  Hebron, 
Damascus,  and  Aleppo,  the  study  of  languages  meanwhile 
going  on,  Mr.  Fiske  working  chiefly  with  Italian  and  modern 
Greek  and  Mr.  King  with  Arabic. 

The  disturbed  state  of  the  country  led  to  withdrawal  from 
Jerusalem  to  Beirut  in  the  spring  of  1825.  Mr.  King's  term 
of  service  expiring  in  August  of  that  year,  he  wrote  a  farewell 
letter  to  his  acquaintances  in  the  land,  which  was  really  an 
argument  for  the  evangelical  faith,  and,  as  translated  into 
Arabic  and  Armenian,  exerted  an  important  influence  in  the 
evangelization  of  Turkey.  On  his  way  to  the  homeland,  he 
learned  of  the  death  of  his  associate  at  Beirut.  The  missionary 
quahfications  of  Phny  Fiske  were  of  the  finest  type,  and 
his  loss  was  an  inexpficable  calamity  to  the  new  enterprise 


REENTERING  BIBLE  LANDS  83 

in  Palestine.  By  such  stern  necessity  the  station  at  Jerusalem 
was  again  closed.  A  final  effort  to  reopen  it  some  nine  years 
later,  though  tenaciously  made,  was  at  length  relinquished, 
Dr.  Joel  Hawes,  who  with  Secretary  Anderson  visited  the  city 
in  1844,  rendering  judgment  that  Jerusalem  bore  such  a  resem- 
blance to  the  contents  of  the  sheet  which  Peter  saw  let  down 
from  heaven  by  its  four  corners  that  it  appeared  an  especially 
disadvantageous  place  for  any  missionary  work. 

The  field  which  Parsons  and  Fiske  had  entered  was  not  to 
be  abandoned.  Rev.  William  Goodell  and  Rev.  Isaac  Bird, 
The  with  their  wives,  had  arrived  at  Beirut  on  Novem- 

Syrian  ber  16,  1823,  just  before  Mr.  Fiske  had  made  his 

Mission  last  visit  to  Jerusalem,  and  they  were  well  settled 
at  the  station  before  he  returned  to  it  to  die.  The  disturbed 
conditions  in  Jerusalem  decided  them  to  locate  at  Beirut  at 
least  for  a  time.  This  busy  seaport,  with  healthful  mountains 
close  by  and  a  friendly  English  consul  at  hand,  was  soon  recog- 
nized as  the  most  promising  center  for  a  permanent  establish- 
ment. The  mixture  of  races  and  religions  there  to  be  reached 
is  indicated  by  the  amazing  variety  of  languages  employed. 
The  Scriptures  were  daily  read  in  Arabic  and  Greek,  ancient 
and  modern,  as  well  as  in  Turkish,  Armenian,  Italian,  and 
English,  while  in  the  table  talk  most  of  these  tongues  were 
heard.  In  Bible  translation,  versions  of  the  Scriptures  in  all 
these  languages  were  used,  besides  those  in  Hebrew,  Syriac, 
and  French.  Among  the  daily  callers  at  the  missionaries' 
house  were  likely  to  be  Arabs,  Turks,  Jews,  and  Maronites, 
with  all  varieties  of  dialect. 

Work  opened  speedily.  Visitors  were  disposed  to  receive 
the  Scriptures  and  religious  tracts.  Soon  schools  were  started, 
beginning  with  one  where  six  Arab  children  were  taught  by 
the  missionaries'  wives;  in  1827  thirteen  free  schools  were  to 
be  found  in  the  city  and  vicinity,  with  600  pupils,  more  than 
100  of  them  girls. 

Opposition  was  aroused  almost  at  once.     Starting  among 


84     STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

the  Roman  Catholics  rather  than  among  the  Turks  or  Arme- 
nians, it  was  directed  particularly  against  the  schools  and 
printing  press.  To  the  influence  of  Rome,  working  through 
its  priests,  was  added  that  of  French  and  Russian  officials, 
scheming  to  crush  out  missionary  efforts.  With  such  ecclesi- 
astical interference  and  the  political  disturbance  of  the  Greek 
revolution  in  1826,  the  situation  appeared  alarming  enough. 
The  landing  of  Greek  troops  in  the  city  brought  on  a  reign  of 
terror,  the  wild  Bedouins  sent  to  drive  out  the  invaders  proving 
even  more  injurious  than  the  foe.  In  the  general  lawlessness 
Mr.  Goodell's  house  was  plundered,  though  restitution  was 
afterward  made.  A  strange  providence  in  the  event  was  that 
the  invasion  caused  the  flight  from  the  city  of  the  Maronite 
bishop  who  had  come  down  from  his  mountain  monastery  to 
compel  his  people  to  drive  out  the  missionaries,  threatening  to 
excommunicate  anyone  who  should  rent  a  house  to  them. 
His  departure  left  the  braver  missionaries  in  possession  of 
the  field. 

In  spite  of  opposition,  advance  was  made  and  converts  won. 
Some  of  these  converts  were  notable  characters  like  the  two 
Armenian  ecclesiastics,  Gregory  Wortabet  and  Garabed  Dio- 
nysius.  These  men,  who  had  been  secured  by  the  missionaries 
as  language  teachers,  under  the  influence  of  this  association 
and  of  Bible  study,  were  won  to  the  evangelical  faith,  becoming 
not  only  shining  examples  of  its  power,  but  effective  preachers 
of  its  truth. 

A  still  more  remarkable  conquest  was  that  of  Asaad  es  Shi- 
diak,  a  Maronite  scholar  and  theologian,  who  had  been  in  the 
employ  of  bishops,  Arab  sheiks,  and  princes,  and  finally  of  the 
patriarch,  and  who,  in  endeavoring  to  controvert  the  mission- 
aries' teaching,  was  led  to  accept  it.  Applying  for  employment, 
he  was  at  first  put  off,  from  suspicion  of  his  motive.  Received 
at  length,  he  became  a  trusted  and  efficient  helper  of  the  mis- 
sionaries until,  ensnared  by  the  patriarch,  he  was  imprisoned, 
beaten,  and  subjected  to  all  kinds  of  cruelty  and  trial;  loaded 


REENTERING  BIBLE  LANDS  85 

with  chains,  he  was  walled  into  a  filthy  prison,  and  fed,  through 
a  hole,  on  the  scantiest  fare,  until,  with  faith  still  unshaken, 
death  at  last  relieved  him  of  his  suffering,  and  his  body  was 
thrown  down  a  mountain-side  among  the  jagged  rocks. 

Other  converts  endured  similar  persecution.  Yet  new  ones 
appeared,  until,  when  Eh  Smith  reached  Beirut,  in  1827,  six- 
teen persons  were  numbered  in  the  mission  church,  gathered 
from  nine  different  communions  and  almost  as  many  races. 
As  hostility  increased  and  reached  even  to  the  missionaries, 
and  as  the  battle  of  Navarino  made  the  whole  land  feverish 
and  the  situation  dangerous,  the  British  consulate  at  Beirut 
was  closed,  and  it  was  felt  necessary  to  suspend  the  mission 
for  a  while.  In  May,  1828,  the  missionaries  embarked  for 
Malta,  taking  with  them  their  language  teachers.  How  critical 
the  situation  had  been  appears  in  a  remark  of  Mr.  Goodell 
that  during  the  last  two  years  of  the  stay  at  Beirut  he  had 
seldom  closed  his  eyes  for  sleep  without  first  thinking  over 
ways  and  means  of  escape,  if  his  enemies  should  come  in  the 
night;  while  on  his  walks  abroad  he  had  been  continually 
looking  for  bushes  and  caves  where  the  persecuted  might  seek 
refuge  in  the  hour  of  danger.  For  months  before  leaving  he 
had  many  of  his  goods  packed,  ready  for  flight,  and  with  money 
so  placed  that,  if  hurried  to  prison,  he  would  not  go  penniless.^ 

The  assembling  of  so  many  missionaries  at  Malta  increased 
the  activity  of  the  printing  estabUshment.  Malta  had  been 
The  Print-  taken  as  the  headquarters  for  this  department  of 
ing  House  work,  not  of  choice,  but  because  when  Rev.  Daniel 
at  Malta  Temple,  in  1822,  brought  to  that  part  of  the  Mediter- 
ranean the  first  press  and  font  of  type  ever  seen  there,  it  was 
judged  unsafe  to  take  them  beyond  the  protection  of  the  British 
flag.  By  1826  a  trained  printer  was  in  charge,  with  an  equip- 
ment of  three  presses  and  fonts  of  type  in  seven  languages, 
though  most  of  the  printing  was  done  in  but  three,  ItaHan, 
modern  Greek,  and  Armeno-Turkish. 

^  The  narrative  of  this  mission  is  resumed  on  page  98. 


86  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

The  New  Testament  in  the  last-named  language  was  soon 
issued  under  the  auspices  of  the  British  and  Foreign  Bible 
Society.  Within  a  decade  the  presses  had  turned  out  350,000 
volumes;  in  all,  21,000,000  pages  of  printed  matter,  and  tracts, 
papers,  and  schoolbooks  were  being  widely  scattered  through 
Turkey  and  Greece.  Many  of  these  tracts  and  books  were 
translations  of  pious  writings,  reflecting  the  religious  ideals  of 
the  time  in  the  homeland  and  written  without  knowledge  of 
the  people  among  whom  they  were  now  circulated.  The 
titles  of  some  of  these  volumes  seem  ludicrously  inappropriate. 
Yet  it  is  to  be  recognized  that,  on  the  whole,  this  literature  did 
accomplish  remarkable  results.  It  was  a  copy  of  The  Dairy- 
man's Daughter,  a  favorite  devotional  work  of  those  days  in 
America,  that  first  roused  Nicomedia  to  the  message  of  the 
missionary  and  brought  the  religious  awakening  there. 

While  in  the  review  of  work  in  the  Syrian  Mission  it  could 
not  be  found  that  there  had  been  a  single  instance  of  radical 
conversion  unto  God  where  there  had  been  no  intercourse 
with  the  missionary,  but  only  the  reading  of  the  printed  word, 
yet  the  judgment  was  decisive  that  the  printing  press  was  to 
be  put  above  all  other  agencies  as  opening  the  eyes  of  the 
people  in  Turkey  to  evangelical  Christianity.  In  the  fields 
of  education  and  reform,  of  social  betterment  and  pohtical 
awakening,  as  well  as  in  distinctively  religious  culture,  the 
work  of  missionary  pubhcation  which  began  at  Malta  has  had 
an  immense  influence  in  all  the  lands  through  which  its  output 
has  flowed. 

By  1833  pohtical  conditions  had  so  improved  in  the  Levant 
that  the  press  could  be  brought  nearer  to  the  center  of  mis- 
Transfer  sionary  operations.  The  Arabic  equipment  was 
of  the  then    taken    to    Beirut,    already    reopened,    which 

Presses  thereupon  became  the  headquarters  for  the  Syrian 
publications,  while  the  Greek,  Turkish,  and  Armenian  equip- 
ment was  transferred  to  Smyrna,  where  some  years  before 
(1826)  the  Board  had  located  two  missionaries.  Rev.  Elnathan 


REENTERING   BIBLE   LANDS  87 

Gridley  and  Rev.  Josiah  Brewer,  the  former  intending  to 
work  particularly  for  Greeks,  the  latter  for  Jews.  Smyrna 
thus  became  the  first  established  center  of  missionary  opera- 
tions strictly  in  Turkey,  and  that  which  had  been  called  the 
Palestine  Mission  was  now  more  properly  named  the  Western 
Asia  Mission. 

The  bringing  of  the  press  to  Smyrna  resulted  in  a  more 
intense  opposition  to  its  work.  Here,  too,  the  Roman  Catho- 
lics were  the  fiercest  opponents,  the  Mohammedans  being 
fairl}^  tolerant  of  the  press  as  of  all  efforts  of  the  American 
missionaries,  partly  because  they  knew  so  Httle  about  America 
as  not  to  feel  the  significance  of  the  mission,  and  partly  because 
they  had  so  great  confidence  in  Islam  that  they  cared  less  what 
the  missionaries  might  do.  But  at  Smyrna  a  new  source  of 
opposition  was  aroused  in  the  Armenians,  who  were  astounded 
to  find  their  former  bishop,  Dionysius,  now  an  expounder  of 
the  new  faith. 

A  lively  sympathy  for  the  Greeks  in  their  struggle  for  inde- 
pendence had  been  awakened  in  America.  In  particular,  the 
Reaching  missionaries  at  Malta  became  interested  in  some 
the  Greek  youth  who  took  refuge  there,  and  who  were 

Greeks  g^nt  to  America  to  be  educated  at  the  expense  of 
the  Board,  for  work  among  their  own  people.  Several  of  the 
number  did  afterward  serve  the  interests  of  missions  in  their 
own  land;  one  of  them  became  famous  as  Professor  Sophocles 
of  Harvard  University.  In  1830,  after  investigation  and  con- 
ference with  Greek  leaders  by  Secretary  Anderson,  the  Board 
began  a  mission  for  Greeks  in  Athens,  then  just  evacuated  by 
the  Turks,  putting  in  charge  of  it  Rev.  Jonas  King,  who  had 
now  returned  to  the  Levant  to  enter  upon  a  remarkable  career 
in  Greece.  Soon  a  school  was  started,  on  the  Lancastrian 
plan,  in  those  days  so  commonly  used  by  the  Board.  Rev. 
Elias  Riggs  and  other  missionaries  followed,  and  new  stations 
were  opened,  both  on  the  mainland  and  on  islands  of  the 
^gean  Sea  and  on  Cyprus. 


88     STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

But  as  the  Greeks  realized  their  independence  they  became 
unfriendly  to  missionary  work,  and  by  intrigue,  slander,  and 
even  open  conflict  piled  obstacles  in  the  path  of  the  mission- 
aries. Absurd  stories  were  circulated  which  roused  the  super- 
stitious fear  of  the  people.  Riots  began  to  break  out,  and 
schools  had  to  be  closed.  A  gradual  withdrawal  from  stations 
followed,  until,  by  1842,  Dr.  King  and  one  associate  at  Athens 
were  the  only  remaining  members  of  the  mission  to  Greece. 
Mr.  Riggs  had  gone  to  Asia  Minor,  where  he  was  to  be  asso- 
ciated with  such  men  as  Temple,  Schneider,  Van  Lennep,  and 
Ladd  in  work  for  the  Greeks  in  Turkey,  which  was  vigorously 
pressed  both  at  Smyrna  and  Broosa.^ 

Secretary  Anderson's  visit  in  1829  had  further  purpose  than 
to  locate  the  mission  to  Greece.  In  view  of  the  closing  of  the 
Relocating  Grseco-Turkish  war  and  the  possibihties  of  freer 
Fields  in  and  broader  fields,  he  was  to  study  the  whole  situa- 
Turkey,  tion  looking  toward  new  locations.  As  a  part  of 
1829  ^Yim  inquiry,  Mr.  Bird  explored  the  north  coast  of 

Africa,  interrogating  Jews,  Moslems,  Roman  Catholics,  and 
men  without  religious  connection,  with  a  view  to  possible  open- 
ings at  Tripoh  and  Tunis,  but  without  favorable  result.  The 
outlook  in  Turkey,  however,  was  found  to  be  brighter.  Mr. 
Bird  was  sent  to  resume  the  mission  at  Beirut  and  Mr.  Goodell 
to  open  a  station  at  Constantinople,  while  Eli  Smith,  with  Har- 
rison Gray  Otis  Dwight,  who  had  just  arrived  as  a  new  appointee, 
was  designated  to  explore  the  eastern  parts  of  the  Turkish 
empire.  This  broadening  of  plan  and  reassignment  of  workers 
mark  a  new  stage  in  the  history  of  the  Turkish  missions. 

It  has  been  already  apparent  that  the  American  Board  did 
not  plant  its  missions  without  careful  investigation.  An  enor- 
TheTourof  nious  amount  of  exploring  hes  back  of  the  choice 
Smith  and  of  fields  and  even  the  determining  of  stations. 
Dwight,  The  pioneers  were  prospectors  and  faithfully 
^^30  scanned  their  territory.     Yet  the  journey  of  Smith 

and  Dwight,   both  in   the  boldness  and  extent  of  its  under- 
1  The  narrative  of  this  mission  is  resumed  on  page  101. 


REENTERING  BIBLE  LANDS  89 

taking  and  in  its  results,  is  conspicuous  in  the  long  list  of  the 
Board's  explorations. 

Leaving  Constantinople  in  May,  1830,  the  travelers  took 
the  road  in  oriental  fashion,  with  camp  equipment  reduced  to 
what  one  packhorse  could  carry,  a  strip  of  carpet  for  a  bed, 
a  fur-lined  pehsse  for  a  wrap,  a  few  cooking  utensils,  and  a 
round  mat  of  leather  which  would  serve  for  a  table  when  they 
halted  and  for  a  bag  in  which  to  carry  their  bread  and  cheese 
when  they  traveled.  To  escape  attention,  if  not  trouble,  they 
wore  oriental  robes  and  turbans  and  enormous  Tartar  stockings 
and  boots.  For  protection  they  had  the  needful  firmans,  pass- 
ports, and  letters  of  introduction,  and  their  guide,  a  Tartar 
chief,  signed  and  sealed  a  contract  before  an  official  by  which 
he  became  responsible  for  their  persons  and  property,  thus 
making  his  government  a  sort  of  accident  insurance  company. 

Their  route  was  the  customary  highway  from  Constantinople 
to  Persia.  They  passed  through  Tokat,  where  they  visited 
Henry  Martyn's  grave,  Erzroom,  Kars,  and  Tiflis,  rested  with 
kindly  German  missionaries  at  Shoosha,  and  pushed  on  through 
Nestorian  country  to  Tabriz,  where  another  sojourn  was  neces- 
sary for  Mr.  Smith's  recuperation  from  illness.  From  Tabriz 
they  toured  somewhat  through  Persia,  acquainting  themselves 
with  the  land,  and  in  particular  with  the  Nestorian  people. 
Their  return  journey  brought  them  to  Constantinople  after 
an  absence  of  a  yekr  and  a  quarter,  to  reveal  in  the  narrative 
of  their  trip.  Christian  Researches  in  Armenia,  a  wealth  of 
information  concerning  the  races,  peoples,  and  religions  of 
the  region  they  had  visited,  so  accurate  and  full  as  to  be  prac- 
tically authoritative  to-day. 

Before  leaving  for  their  long  tour,  Messrs.  Smith  and  Dwight 
had  earnestly  recommended  that  Constantinople  should  be 
Constant!-  made  a  station  of  the  American  Board.  They 
nople  at  returned  to  find  Mr.  Goodell  already  established 
^^^*  there   and   work   among   the   Armenians   definitely 

begun.     So  strategic  is  this  capital  for  any  enterprise  within 


90     STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

the  Turkish  empire  that  it  seems  strange  the  American  Board 
should  have  come  to  it  by  so  roundabout  a  route.  Then  as 
now  the  great  highways  between  East  and  West  passed  through 
that  city.  All  the  races  and  religious  communities  within  the 
Turkish  empire  looked  to  their  representatives  in  Constanti- 
nople for  the  protection  of  their  rights.  Moreover,  the  prestige 
of  the  sultan  as  padishah  (father  of  all  the  sovereigns  of  the 
earth)  and  caliph  of  Islam  made  him  a  mighty  figure  beyond 
the  boundaries  of  his  empire.  It  was  inevitable  that  the 
Board  should  settle  at  length  upon  Constantinople  as  its  base 
for  the  Turkish  missions. 

In  William  Goodell  the  right  man  was  found  to  open  this 
important  station.  With  breadth  of  vision,  deep  spiritual  life, 
sympathy,  courage,  bubbling  humor,  and  patient  devotion, 
disciplined  by  his  experience  at  Beirut  and  Malta,  he  was 
remarkably  fitted  for  the  delicate  and  difficult  task  of  laying 
foundations  at  the  capital.  Associated  with  him  almost  from 
the  beginning  and  for  more  than  a  generation  were  Dr.  Dwight, 
assigned  to  this  post  upon  return  from  his  tour,  and  Will- 
iam Schauffier,  whose  special  task  was  to  reach  the  Spanish 
Jews  who,  upon  their  expulsion  from  Spain,  had  crowded  into 
Constantinople  more  of  their  race  than  were  then  in  any  other 
city  of  the  world. 

At  its  beginning  the  new  station  suffered  a  baptism  of  fire. 
Within  two  months  of  Goodell's  arrival,  his  home  and  all  its 
furnishings  went  up  in  flames.  Though  fires  were  continually 
recurring,  five  threatening  in  a  single  year,  other  dangers  even 
more  serious  were  felt.  In  1832  the  black  plague  broke  out, 
followed  by  cholera,  with  which  Mr.  Goodell  was  shghtly 
attacked.  The  plague  was  almost  constant  in  the  city,  com- 
pelUng  the  frequent  closing  of  schools  and  cutting  off  com- 
munication with  the  people;  Mrs.  Dwight  and  her  child  died 
of  it  in  1837.  The  seclusion  of  these  times  gave  the  mission- 
aries opportunity  to  pursue  their  language  studies  and  to 
prepare  new  material  for  publication. 


REENTERING  BIBLE  LANDS  91 

Missionary  work  among  the  Armenians  was  begun  quietly 
and  carefully.  The  investigations  of  Smith  and  Dwight  had 
Beginning  shown  that  they  were  one  of  the  great  and  virile 
among  the  races  of  Turkey.  Industrious,  temperate,  thrifty, 
Armenians  ^]^q  bankers  of  the  empire,  furnishing  in  large  meas- 
ure the  strength  of  its  commercial  and  industrial  classes,  the 
Armenians  were  also  a  religious  people,  strict  in  the  observance 
of  the  forms  of  their  national  Church.  Won  to  Christianity 
in  the  fourth  century  by  St.  Gregory  the  Illuminator,  the 
Armenians  named  their  branch  of  the  Church  after  the  famous 
preacher.  Regarding  the  word  of  Scripture  with  almost  super- 
stitious reverence,  and  in  doctrine  closely  allied  with  eastern 
Christianity,  this  Gregorian  Church  yet  separated  from  the 
Greek  Church  after  the  council  of  Chalcedon,  whose  decisions 
it  rejected.  It  was  estimated  that  100,000  of  these  Armenians 
were  then  located  in  Constantinople. 

The  missionaries  discovered  that  there  were  already  signs 
of  an  awakening  in  the  Gregorian  Church;  reformers  and  relig- 
ious enthusiasts  had  striven  to  break  through  its  formalism. 
The  British  and  Foreign  Bible  Society  had  put  the  Scriptures 
within  the  reach  of  the  more  educated  classes  in  the  ancient 
Armenian  tongue,  and  had  just  brought  out  the  New  Testa- 
ment in  the  vernacular,  making  it  available  for  all  to  read. 
Dr.  King's  letter  on  leaving  Syria  had  made  a  deep  impression 
upon  some  prominent  Armenians  in  Constantinople,  to  whom 
it  had  been  sent,  and,  in  the  hope  of  purifying  the  Church,  a 
new  training-school  for  priests  had  been  organized  by  the 
scholarly  and  devout  leader,  Peshtimaljian.  Although  he  did 
not  venture  openly  to  ally  himself  with  the  missionaries,  this 
remarkable  man  privately  encouraged  his  pupils  to  come  in 
contact  with  them  and  by  all  the  force  of  his  own  evangeUc 
temper  sought  to  inspire  a  new  type  of  priests  for  the  ancient 
Church. 

With  such  preparation  and  encouragement,  the  beginning  of 
work  in  Constantinople  was  a  far  different  matter  from  what 


92     STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

it  had  been  in  Syria.  Even  the  Armenian  patriarch,  inter- 
viewed by  Mr.  Goodell  concerning  a  better  grade  of  schools, 
responded,  with  oriental  courtesy,  that  if  his  visitor  had  not 
come  to  him,  he  must  certainly  have  gone  to  see  Mr.  Goodell! 

The  purpose  was  not  to  proselyte  the  Armenians.  At  first, 
the  missionaries  established  no  schools,  but  sought  to  encourage 
and  aid  this  people  in  starting  its  own  schools.  Likewise  at 
first,  they  held  no  pubhc  services,  conducting  worship  only 
for  their  famiHes  and  other  English-speaking  Christians  in 
the  city.  They  attended  services  in  both  Gregorian  and  Greek 
churches,  often  taking  part  at  the  invitation  of  those  in  author- 
ity. Their  evangelizing  efforts  were  thus  confined  to  such 
personal  interviews  as  they  might  have  with  those  who  called 
upon  them  or  whom  they  might  meet  as  they  went  here  and 
there.  ''We  tell  them  frankly,"  said  Mr.  Goodell, '' '  You  have 
sects  enough  among  you  already,  and  we  have  no  design  of 
setting  up  a  new  one,  or  of  pulling  down  your  churches,  or 
drawing  away  members  from  them  in  order  to  build  up  our 
own.'"  As  helpers,  never  as  antagonists,  the  missionaries  of 
the  American  Board  went  to  meet  the  Armenian  people  and 
their  Church. 

Results  began  to  appear  so  early  as  1833,  when  some  earnest- 
minded  students  accepted  the  evangefical  faith.     Opposition 
was  aroused  when  inquirers  and  visitors  increased. 

^"^^ .  In  that  year  fifteen  priests  trained  in  Peshtimal- 
jian's  school  were  ordained  in  the  old  Church.  These 
men  had  caught  the  new  vision  and  went  to  their  ministry 
with  a  new  spirit.  Later  they  cast  in  their  lot  with  the  Evan- 
geHcals,  as  those  came  to  be  called  who  were  reading  the  New 
Testament  and  living  by  its  message,  in  the  face  of  ecclesias- 
tical disapproval.  Soon  an  Evangelical  Union  was  organized  of 
those  who  were  seeking  to  reform  the  Gregorian  Church  and  a 
secret  correspondence  was  begun  with  men  of  influence  through- 
out the  empire.  At  this  time  the  sole  aim  of  the  EvangeHcals 
was  to  redeem  their  Church  to  a  more  vital  rehgion. 


REENTERING  BIBLE  LANDS  93 

The  movement  spread  from  Constantinople  to  other  centers. 
Schools  were  established,  notably  one  for  girls  at  Smyrna. 
As  new  missionaries  arrived,  new  stations  were  opened.  Ben- 
jamin Schneider  began  his  career  at  Broosa,  the  ancient  capital 
of  the  Ottoman  empire,  in  1834;  Trebizond  was  occupied  on 
the  shore  of  the  Black  Sea.  By  this  time,  too,  the  awakening 
had  begun  in  Nicomedia,  where  Mr.  Goodell,  passing  through 
the  city  a  few  years  before,  had  left  some  tracts,  among  them 
a  copy  of  The  Dairyman's  Daughter. 

As  the  evangehcal  influence  began  to  be  felt  in  the  land,  the 
spirit  of  persecution  was  roused  in  the  Gregorian  Church. 
Persecution  Sporadic  cases  of  opposition  culminated  in  1839  in 
Begins,  an  outbreak  of  vigorous  persecution.  The  higher 
^^39  clergy    had    become    frightened.     As    priests    they 

dreaded  to  lose  any  of  their  power  over  the  people;  as  politi- 
cians they  were  suspicious  of  a  movement  which  might  dis- 
integrate the  ancient  Church,  now  the  only  bond  of  the  Armenian 
race.  The  tolerant  patriarch  was  replaced;  a  hst  of  those 
suspected  of  heresy  was  said  to  contain  the  names  of  500 
prominent  persons,  bishops,  priests,  and  bankers.  Arrests  were 
made  and  terror  spread.  Repeated  pronouncements  by  both 
Greek  and  Armenian  ecclesiastics  denounced  the  missionaries 
as  '^Satanic  heresiarchs  from  the  caverns  of  hell  and  the  abyss 
of  the  northern  ocean."  Schools  were  broken  up;  the  press 
was  silenced;  books  were  burned  in  bonfires  upon  city  squares. 
A  systematic  effort  to  expel  the  missionaries  was  likely  to 
have  succeeded  had  not  war  broken  out  between  the  pasha  of 
Egypt  and  the  sultan,  which  terminated  in  the  defeat  and 
death  of  the  latter,  and  stayed  the  persecution.^ 

The  tour  of  Smith  and  Dwight  had  brought  to  light  another 
people,  the  Nestorians  of  Persia  and  the  highlands  of  Kur- 
distan. Deriving  its  name  from  a  patriarch  of  Constanti- 
nople deposed  as  a  heretic  in  the  fifth  century,  this  ancient 
sect  of  the  Christian  Church  was  at  first  full  of  missionary 
*  The  narrative  of  this  mission  ia  resumed  on  page  102. 


94     STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

spirit;  it  carried  the  gospel  not  only  to  Persia  and  Assyria, 
but  even  into  India  and  China.  Conquered  at  length  by 
TheNesto-  ^^^  sword  of  Tamerlane,  the  Nestorians  had  been 
rian  Mis-  reduced  in  numbers  and  broken  in  spirit;  still 
sion,  1834  Christian  in  name,  rejecting  all  images  and  the 
confessional,  regarding  with  superstitious  reverence  the  word 
of  Scripture,  liberal  toward  other  sects,  they  had  yet  become 
formal  in  their  religious  observance  and  so  ignorant  and  de- 
graded mentally  and  morally  that  they  were  practically  a 
dead  church  in  the  midst  of  an  oppressive  Mohammedanism. 

But  when  the  first  missionaries  to  be  sent  them,  Rev.  and 
Mrs.  Justin  Perkins,  arrived  in  1833,  after  nearly  a  year's 
journey  so  arduous  that  they  reached  Tabriz  more  dead  than 
alive,  they  received  an  inspiring  welcome  among  this  people. 
The  first  Nestorian  with  whom  Mr.  Perkins  shook  hands  was 
the  bishop,  Mar  Yohannan,  evermore  a  fast  friend  of  the  mis- 
sion. When  the  patriarch  in  the  mountains  was  visited  he 
greeted  the  missionaries  with  the  words:  "Thanks  be  to  God. 
This  is  what  I  have  been  praying  for."  Tours  of  the  villages 
were  like  triumphs,  the  Nestorians  flocking  out  in  welcome, 
sometimes  with  drums  and  trumpets.  Nowhere  else  in  all 
these  lands  of  the  Bible  were  the  missionaries  received  with 
such  simple-hearted  and  eager  trust. 

The  city  of  Urumia,  in  the  province  and  by  the  lake  of  the 
same  name,  was  chosen  as  the  first  station  for  the  Perkinses 
and  Dr.  and  Mrs.  Asahel  Grant,  who  joined  them 
Z~^  the  first  year.     Here,  with  the  help  of  Nestorian 

priests  who  were  ready  to  be  associated  with  them, 
Mar  Yohannan  himself  acting  as  their  language  teacher,  they 
set  themselves  to  form  a  written  language,  translate  parts  of 
the  Scriptures  and  make  the  customary  beginnings. 

Dr.  Grant's  skill  as  a  physician  was  of  utmost  importance 
in  winning  the  favor  of  the  people,  and  he  was  at  once  beset 
by  patients  of  all  races  and  rehgions.  Many  came  from  long 
distances  to  carry  back  tidings  of  the  new  arrivals.     Kurdish 


REENTERING  BIBLE  LANDS  95 

chiefs,  princes  and  governors  of  provinces,  and  Persian  nobles 
came  with  the  humblest  to  kiss  his  feet  and  to  seek  his  help. 

The  first  attempt  to  bring  in  a  printing  estabhshment  in 
1837  failed  because  of  the  insurmountable  difficulties  of  the 
overland  route.  But  two  years  later  a  press  so  made  that  it 
could  be  taken  to  pieces  and  carried  in  parts  was  secured,  and 
with  the  arrival  of  a  printer,  the  mission  was  prepared  to 
scatter  its  message  widely  and  to  meet  the  increasing  attacks 
of  the  Jesuits. 

The  missionaries  to  the  Nestorians  had  received  the  same 
instructions  as  did  those  sent  to  the  Armenians:  there  was  to 
be  no  attempt  to  proselyte,  only  an  effort  to  help  this  enfeebled 
church  to  take  once  more  a  commanding  place  in  the  regenera- 
tion of  Asia.  At  once  native  helpers  became  available  and 
opportunities  for  reaching  the  people  were  practically  unlim- 
ited.    In  a  few  years  the  mission  was  in  full  operation. 

As  the  missionaries  went  among  the  villages  they  were 
appalled  at  the  degradation  of  this  ancient  people.  Their 
poverty  made  their  homes  little  better  than  the  abodes  of 
beasts;  indeed,  their  animals  shared  these  quarters.  The 
devotion  of  the  missionaries  was  sorely  tested  in  the  neces- 
sary contact  with  filth  and  corruption.  It  was  under  the 
appeal  of  this  poverty  that  at  first  all  costs  of  the  work  were 
met  by  the  mission,  allowances  even  being  made  to  scholars  for 
support,  while  the  native  teachers  were  paid  from  the  mission 
treasury. 

The  early  death  of  Mrs.  Grant,  just  as  a  good  beginning 
had  been  made  in  her  work  for  girls,  was  bitterly  lamented  of 
The  all.    Thereafter  Dr.  Grant  gave  himself  particularly 

Mountain  to  missionary  exploration  among  the  Nestorians  on 
Nestorians  ^]^g  ^^st  side  of  the  Kurdish  mountains,  a  task  for 
which  his  fearlessness,  tact,  energy,  and  resourcefulness  spe- 
cially qualified  him.  So  from  1839  to  1845  he  was  chiefly 
occupied  near  the  headwaters  of  the  Euphrates  and  Tigris 
rivers,   visiting    cities  where  afterward    stations  were    estab- 


96     STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

lished.  With  his  far  vision  he  desired  to  have  the  undertaking 
called  by  no  racial  name,  but  rather  to  be  known  as  a  mission 
to  Assyria  and  Mesopotamia. 

The  stories  of  his  tours  are  full  of  adventure  and  romance. 
Whether  facing  winter  storms  on  the  mountains,  avoiding 
brigandsj  meeting  warlike  chiefs,  or  visiting  disturbed  cities 
across  the  border,  this  dauntless  man  was  in  almost  constant 
danger.  When  he  and  Mr.  Homes  went  to  Mardin  for  refuge 
in  the  tumultuous  days  following  the  Egyptian  war,  they 
barely  escaped  alive,  as  a  mob  closed  the  city  gates,  only  to 
find  that  they  had  barred  out  the  very  men  they  had  meant 
to  shut  in  for  slaughter.  Mr.  Homes  thereupon  withdrew 
to  Constantinople,  but  Dr.  Grant  declared  that  the  voice  that 
called  his  friend  back  seemed  to  cry  to  him,  ''On  to  the  moun- 
tains!" And  he  went  on  to  new  experiences  in  those  frowning 
fastnesses,  to  be  welcomed  by  mountaineers,  and  received  by 
the  patriarch.  Mar  Shimon,  and  even  summoned  by  the  emir 
of  the  Hakary  Kurds  to  attend  him  in  illness.  Conducted 
through  dark  passageways  guarded  by  iron  doors  and  ghstening 
with  guns,  spears,  and  daggers,  he  was  entirely  at  the  mercy  of 
this  high-handed  chieftain  by  whose  orders  a  German  mission- 
ary had  lately  been  put  to  death.  Undismayed,  he  went  on; 
the  emir  recovered  and  ever  after  showed  his  gratitude  to  the 
fearless  doctor. 

Yet  to  the  end  his  task  was  a  hard  and  lonely  one.  When 
reenforcements  were  sent,  either  pohtical  or  ecclesiastical  inter- 
ference barred  them  out.  But  for  a  long  while,  amid  the 
tumult  of  the  time,  he  was  able  to  go  his  way,  meeting  all 
classes  and  races  in  the  mountains,  Nestorians,  Armenians, 
Yezedees,  and  Jacobites,  and  trusted  and  welcomed  of  all. 
Single-handed  he  tried  to  hold  his  ground  in  the  advancing 
tempest  of  war.  At  last,  when  the  slaughter  of  Nestorians 
by  the  Kurds  devastated  the  whole  mountain  district,  Dr. 
Grant  was  compelled  to  flee,  until,  in  the  midst  of  the  catas- 
trophe, he  was  released  from  his  troubles.     Dr.  Azariah  Smith 


REENTERING  BIBLE  LANDS  97 

and  Mr.  Laurie,  prevented  from  joining  him  before,  reached 
Mosul  in  time  to  witness  his  departure  from  this  hfe. 

The  western  branch  of  the  Nestorian  mission  was  then  of 
necessity  discontinued.  If  the  work  of  Grant  seemed  to  have 
little  immediate  accomplishment,  his  figure  stands  like  that 
of  Livingstone  in  Africa,  a  great  pioneer  and  pathfinder,  open- 
ing up  to  knowledge  and  interest,  and  at  length  to  influence, 
an  important  region  of  human  need. 

While  the  effort  in  the  mountains  was  thus  checked,  the 
work  on  the  plains  was  advancing  rapidly.  On  a  furlough 
which  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Perkins  enjoyed  in  the  home- 
.  ^°^^®^ .  land,  they  were  accompanied,  through  his  own 
determination,  by  Mar  Yohannan,  whose  presence 
in  the  United  States  made  great  impression  upon  the  friends 
of  missions  and  awoke  new  interest  in  his  people.  The  return 
to  the  field  was  marked  by  a  more  evident  progress.  So  far, 
results  had  seemed  few  and  slow  in  coming.  In  the  first  eight 
years  not  more  than  four  converts  had  been  won.  Sickness,  suf- 
fering, and  death  had  sadly  depleted  the  mission  forces.  The  sit- 
uation now,  however,  was  ready  for  advance;  all  the  machinery 
of  mission  work  was  in  operation  and  a  warmer  type  of  evan- 
gelical teaching  marked  the  life  of  the  Nestorian  churches. 

The  influence  of  Miss  Fidelia  Fiske,  who  had  come  from  her 
post  in  Mount  Holj^oke  to  take  charge  of  the  seminary  for 
girls  at  Urumia,  soon  to  be  called  the  Mount  Holyoke  of  Persia, 
and  of  Mr.  Stoddard,  whom  Mr.  Perkins  had  seized  upon  as 
the  desired  helper  for  the  boys'  boarding-school,  and  whose 
presence  in  the  churches  in  America  has  been  likened  to  that 
of  a  flaming  seraph,  brought  to  the  melting  point  the  slowly 
yielding  formalism  of  Nestorian  religious  life.  Despite  dis- 
turbance and  interference  from  priests  and  politicians,  and  the 
efforts  of  the  patriarch,  who  now  set  himself  openly  against 
the  mission  and  its  schools,  soon  there  were  seen  the  glad 
signs  of  religious  interest.  They  appeared  first  in  1846  in 
the  little  village  of  Geog  Tapa,  which  became  suddenly  bright 


98     STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

with  spiritual  light;  then  the  new  power  was  manifest  in  the 
school,  whence  it  reached  out  to  parents  and  friends  of  the 
students.  The  father  of  one  of  the  girls,  coming  to  visit  his 
daughter,  ridiculed  the  signs  of  religious  interest,  but  soon  him- 
self became  a  Christian,  and  later  an  evangelist,  traveling  through 
the  mountains,  ^' in  his  huge  turban,  striped  jacket,  and  Turkish 
trousers,  with  his  Bible  and  knapsack,  telling  of  Christ." 

The  effect  of  this  revival  and  of  another  which  came  two 
years  afterward  was  measured  not  only  by  the  number  of 
converts  that  could  be  counted,  but  by  the  changed  aspect  of 
villages  on  the  plains  and  even  in  the  mountains.  From 
these  revivals  devoted  and  efficient  Nestorian  Christians  arose 
to  become  remarkable  preachers  and  witnesses  for  Christ. 
Persecution  continued  and  even  strengthened  under  the  lead 
of  the  patriarch.  At  length  the  government  interfered  and, 
despite  bitter  opposition,  in  1851  issued  an  edict  of  toleration, 
which,  like  that  of  the  Turkish  sultan,  a  year  previous,  gave 
protection  alike  to  all  Christian  subjects. 

After  two  years'  sojourn  in  Malta  the  missionaries  were  able 
to  return  to  Syria.  Scarcely  had  they  begun  again  at  Beirut, 
The  gathering  up  the  broken  threads  and  finding  a  wel- 

Return  to  come  from  some  faithful  converts  and  renewed  opposi- 
Syria,  1830  tion  from  the  Maronites,  when  an  outbreak  of  plague 
(See  p.  85)  ^^^  cholera,  followed  by  the  disturbance  of  the 
Egyptian  war,  once  more  interrupted  the  work  of  the  mission. 
How  bitter  was  the  Maronite  opposition  appears  in  the  formal 
curse  which  the  patriarch  uttered  against  the  missionaries  at 
this  time,  as  he  warned  the  people  against  them:  "They  are 
therefore  accursed,  cut  off  from  all  Christian  communion;  and 
let  the  curse  envelop  them  as  a  robe  and  spread  through  all 
their  members  like  oil,  break  them  in  pieces  like  a  potter's 
vessel  and  wither  them  like  the  fig  tree  cursed  by  the  mouth 
of  the  Lord  himself;  let  the  evil  angel  rule  over  them  by  day 
and  by  night,  asleep  and  awake,  and  in  whatever  circumstances 
they  may  be  found.     We  permit  no  one  to  visit  them,  or  employ 


REENTERING  BIBLE  LANDS  99 

them,  or  do  them  a  favor,  or  give  them  a  salutation,  or  con- 
verse with  them  in  any  form  or  manner,  but  let  them  be  avoided 
as  a  putrid  member  and  as  helhsh  dragons."  When  the  block- 
ade of  Beirut  by  the  Anglo-French  fleet  began,  the  missionaries 
were  again  forced  to  flee,  this  time  to  Cyprus.  The  Turkish 
government  soon  being  restored  by  the  western  powers,  mis- 
sionary work  was  resumed  under  quieter  conditions. 

Progress  was  at  first  very  slow;  it  seemed  that  little  impres- 
sion had  been  made  on  the  masses.  Persecution  from  eccle- 
siastical leaders  and  political  disorder  in  the  mountains  were 
a  constant  hindrance.  Yet  advance  was  made,  particularly  in 
the  matter  of  schools.  By  1835  ten  schools  were  counted, 
with  300  pupils.  Besides  those  of  elementary  character,  there 
was  the  beginning  of  a  boys'  seminary,  which  later  removed 
to  Abeih.  At  the  same  time  a  girls'  school  had  been  opened 
at  Beirut,  the  first  of  its  kind  in  all  Syria,  where  at  that  time 
it  was  said  there  was  not  one  girl  who  could  read. 

Among  the  missionary  reenforcements  of  the  period  were  such 
men  as  EH  Smith,  C.  V.  A.  Van  Dyck,  Wilham  M.  Thomson, 
and  Simeon  Calhoun.  The  securing  of  a  new  printing  press, 
and,  by  the  skill  of  Dr.  Smith,  the  preparation  of  elegant 
fonts  of  type  whifjh  caught  the  eye  of  Arabic  scholars,  marked 
a  new  stage  in  the  publication  department  of  this  mission. 
And  the  life-long  service  of  Drs.  Smith  and  Van  Dyck  was 
begun  in  the  translating  and  preparing  of  those  books  which 
were  to  make  the  Beirut  mission  press  famous  and  influential 
through  all  its  territory.  Tours  of  investigation  were  now 
made  in  the  Hauran,  east  of  the  Jordan,  the  message  of  the 
gospel  thus  being  carried  to  new  peoples,  notably  to  the 
Bedouin  Arabs. 

It  looked  for  a  time  as  if  that  small  but  powerful  people  of 
TheDruzes  the  mountains,  the  Druzes,  Mohammedan  in  name, 
of  the  but  scarcely  more  than  pagan  in  fact,  would  come 

Lebanon  Qygj.  ^q  Christianity  en  masse.  Overtures  were  made 
by  them  about  1835,  during  the  disturbance  of  the  Egyptian 


100  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

war.  The  missionaries  feeling  somewhat  doubtful  about  such 
wholesale  proposals  applied  their  usual  cautious  tests  of  con- 
verts. At  length  it  appeared  that  the  real  desire  of  the  Druzes 
was  to  escape  military  service  on  the  ground  of  being  Chris- 
tians; when  the  sincerity  of  their  motive  was  tested,  their 
zeal  for  changing  their  religion  slackened,  until  only  one  Druze 
could  be  found  who,  with  wife  and  family,  stood  the  test  and 
was  baptized  into  the  Christian  faith.  While  the  Druzes, 
whom  the  Maronites  forever  prejudiced  against  their  form  of 
Christianity,  still  were  inclined  to  ally  themselves  with  the 
Protestants,  the  Turkish  sultan  marched  an  army  into  the 
Lebanon,  with  Moslem  teachers  and  sheiks  in  its  train,  and 
compelled  the  Druzes  to  declare  themselves  unflinchingly 
Moslem.  So  all  attempts  to  Christianize  this  people  came 
for  a  time  to  an  abrupt  close. 

A  visit  from  Secretary  Anderson  and  Dr.  Hawes  in  1844,  in 
the  course  of  their  deputation  tour  of  the  Levant,  brought 
Seeing  fresh  inspiration  to  the  missionaries  and  set  them 

Results  at  to  greater  efforts  for  the  harassed  people  of  Syria. 
Last  Increased  emphasis  was  now  put  upon  the  organ- 

izing of  groups  of  converts  into  churches,  and  the  laying  of 
responsibility  upon  them.  It  was  resolved  also  that  the 
absorbing  work  of  school  and  press  must  not  crowd  out  those 
tours  which  increased  the  acquaintance  and  influence  of  the 
missionaries  among  the  outlying  peoples  not  yet  enough  inter- 
ested to  come  to  them. 

What  brought  special  cheer  at  this  time  was  the  appearance 
at  last  of  a  general  religious  awakening.  It  came  in  the  vil- 
lage of  Hasbeiya,  at  the  foot  of  Mount  Hermon,  a  place  of 
about  5000  inhabitants,  a  mixture  of  Druzes,  Greeks, 
Moslems,  and  Jews.  A  company  seceding  from  the  Greek 
Church  because  of  discontent  with  its  unworthy  ministry 
applied  to  the  missionaries  at  Beirut  for  instruction.  When 
the  missionaries  visited  Hasbeiya  they  were  amazed  to  find 
how  genuine  and  deep  was  the  reformation.     At  length,  after 


REENTERING  BIBLE   LANDS  101 

careful  examination  and  training,  on  a  Sabbath  in  July,  1844, 
sixty-eight  of  these  people  entered  into  solemn  covenant, 
binding  themselves  Avith  hand  on  the  Bible  to  hve  and  worship 
in  accord  with  the  evangelical  faith.  The  missionaries  were 
almost  overcome  with  the  spectacle  and  with  all  it  seemed 
to  promise.  In  other  places,  families,  singly  or  in  groups, 
and  sometimes  whole  villages  showed  a  disposition  to  break 
with  the  formahsm  of  their  ancient  Church.  Persecution, 
which  had  been  sharp  before,  now  was  redoubled.  At  Has- 
beiya  some  were  obUged  to  flee  for  their  lives;  some  yielded 
to  the  demands  of  the  patriarch.  But  many  held  fast  and  the 
reformation  was  estabhshed. 

A  new  war  breaking  out  between  Druzes  and  Maronites  in 
1845,  the  mountains  were  filled  with  bloodshed  and  terror. 
Once  more  the  Druzes,  far  fewer  in  number,  defeated  their 
hereditary  foe.  The  sky  was  cleared  for  the  Protestants  at 
Hasbeiya,  whose  persecutors  were  driven  out.  The  mission- 
aries used  the  opportunity  of  this  war  to  render  service  to  the 
combatants  impartially,  and  won  the  respect  and  good-will 
of  both  factions.  At  the  close  of  the  war,  work  was  resumed 
and  schools  strengthened  at  the  principal  stations.  New 
stations  were  projected,  new  missionaries  eagerly  called  for. 
Protestants  were  now  better  protected,  and  in  spite  of  the 
bull  of  excommunication  from  the  Greek  patriarch,  persecu- 
tion largely  subsided.  In  1848  it  was  possible  to  organize 
the  first  purely  native  church  at  Beirut.  Two  years  later, 
one  was  formed  at  Hasbeiya.  The  missionaries  had  begun  to 
see  the  results  of  their  labors. 

The  Board's  mission  in  Greece,  after  1842,  for  the  rest  of  this 
period,  and,  indeed,  for  the  remainder  of  his  life  was  limited 
Dr.  King  to  Dr.  King's  ministry  in  Athens.  His  figure,  as 
in  Greece  with  his  devoted  wife  he  stood  alone  for  the  evan- 
(See  p.  88)  gelical  faith  in  the  proud  capital  of  Greece,  is  pecul- 
iarly appealing.  So  able  of  mind  that  he  could  outstrip  the 
Greek  ecclesiastics  in  argument  and  silence  them  by  the  apt- 


102  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN   BOARD 

ness  of  his  quotations  from  the  Fathers,  he  was  at  the  same 
time  calm  of  temper  to  meet  every  threat,  tactful  in  method  to 
avoid  trouble  so  far  as  possible,  unflinching  in  the  maintenance 
of  his  rights  and  patient  in  waiting  for  his  opportunity.  He 
was  almost  continuously  assailed  with  charges  and  threats, 
led  before  the  courts  on  one  pretext  or  another,  his  case  being 
carried  from  court  to  court,  while  plots  of  crafty  ecclesiastics 
and  the  anger  of  sudden  mobs  endangered  his  life.  Through 
all  he  was  absolutely  fearless,  yet  cautious,  seeming  to  know 
just  when  to  venture  forth  and  when  to  abide  in  his  house, 
when  to  open  it  for  a  service  and  when  to  withdraw  from  it 
into  temporary  hiding.  After  an  escape  from  legal  attack  or 
personal  violence,  he  would  go  again  into  the  city,  talking 
freely  of  religion  to  all  whom  he  met,  exchanging  greetings 
even  with  priests  on  the  street.  With  this  combination  of 
courageous  defiance  and  conciliatory  submission,  he  would  at 
one  time  claim  his  rights  against  the  governor  of  Attica  to  the 
same  religious  privileges  as  were  enjoyed  hy  the  Roman  Cath- 
olics, and  at  another  withdraw  from  the  country,  upon  a  hint 
from  the  king  of  Greece  that  he  could  relieve  the  situation  by 
'taking  a  journey."  From  such  a  temporary  absence  he 
had  just  returned  (1848)  as  this  period  ends  to  meet  new 
dangers  and  trials  in  the  years  afterward. 

Upon  the  close  of  the  Egyptian  war,  with  a  new  sultan  upon 
the  throne  and  the  more  tolerant  patriarch,  Stephan,  returned 
-,,  to  office,  there  was  for  a  time  some  respite  of  per- 

Armenian  secution  for  the  Armenians.  And  now  it  became 
Reforma-  apparent  how  the  evangelical  revival  had  grown 
tion,  1840-  even  through  the  efforts  to  suppress  it.  It  was 
S°  soon  found  that  the  evangehcal  message  had  been 

^^  ^"  carried  far  into  the  interior,  the  fire  of  it  not  having 

been  beaten  out,  but  only  scattered  to  ignite  new  places.  A 
station  was  opened  in  1840  at  Erzroom  to  the  east;  others 
nearer  to  Constantinople  were  begun  at  Nicomedia  and 
Adabazar.     A  native  mission  was  started  in  the   interior  of 


REENTERING  BIBLE  LANDS  103 

Asia  Minor.  Prayer  meetings  and  preaching  services  for 
women,  first  held  at  Pera,  were  maintained,  and  lay  brethren 
as  well  as  missionaries  were  traveling  here  and  there,  preach- 
ing the  gospel.  It  was  clear  to  all  that  there  was  a  power- 
ful and  wide  evangelical  awakening  among  the  Armenian 
people. 

Yet,  through  all,  the  work  was  associated  with  the  ancient 
Church;  the  Evangelicals  were  still  a  part  of  it.  The  reform 
was  being  wrought  from  within.  The  change  in  the  attitude 
of  the  Armenian  community  and  the  development  of  its  spiritual 
life  were  apparent;  even  the  vartabeds,  the  celibate  preaching 
clergy  of  the  Gregorian  Church,  were  declaring  the  gospel 
message  with  earnestness  and  power.  The  work  of  the  mis- 
sionaries was  still  largely  the  training  and  encouragement  of 
new  leaders  in  the  old  Church.  To  this  end  the  press  was 
busy.  Mr.  Goodell's  translation  of  the  Old  Testament  into 
Armeno-Turkish  and  his  revision  of  the  New  Testament  now 
appeared.  Armenian  and  Greek  magazines  and  papers  as 
well  as  books  were  helping  to  spread  evangelical  teaching. 
Theological  training  was  begun  by  Mr.  Dwight,  and  the  sem- 
inary at  Bebek  was  enlarged  and  broadened  as  to  its  courses. 

This  famous  school  at  Bebek,  above  Constantinople  on  the 
European  side  of  the  Bosphorus,  had  been  opened  in  1840  by 
Cyrus  Hamlin,  who  had  just  come  to  the  mission,  and  who 
sought  to  make  of  it  a  boarding-school  for  boys  and  young 
men.  The  marvelous  ability  of  this  new  missionary  was 
shown  in  the  energy  and  skill  with  which  he  built,  almost  out 
of  nothing,  in  the  face  of  determined  opposition  and  under 
the  very  eyes  of  the  Porte,  this  training-school  of  leaders  for 
the  new  era.  The  story  of  how  he  planned  the  school,  over- 
came difficulties,  readjusted  it  to  changed  circumstances,  and 
through  it  brought  a  host  of  things  to  pass,  reads  like  a  romance. 
His  most  famous  activities  fall  in  the  next  period,  but  in  the 
years  of  beginning  Hamlin  showed  those  qualities  which  made 
him  the  terror  of  the  evasive  Turk,  the  idol  of  the  people  whom 


104  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

he  served,  and  the  admiration  even  of  his  more  conservative 
colleagues. 

The  mission  to  the  Armenians  was  now  thoroughly  organ- 
ized and  at  work.  A  long  conference  was  had  with  Secretary 
Anderson  and  Dr.  Hawes  on  their  deputation  visit,  in  which 
it  was  determined  that  the  Greek  department  should  be  dis- 
continued, and  that  henceforth  the  work  for  Greeks  should 
be  separated  from  that  for  Armenians,  the  latter  to  be  strength- 
ened and  developed  in  all  possible  ways. 

A  fresh  campaign  of  persecution  for  the  Armenians  began  in 
the  autumn  of  1844  with  the  appointment  of  a  new  patriarch, 
Matteos.  The  surprise  and  distress  of  this  on- 
„?^  ^  o  ^  slaught  were  the  greater  in  that,  following  upon 
some  outrageous  executions  by  Turkish  officials  in 
1843,  the  European  powers,  under  the  lead  of  the  British  ambas- 
sador. Sir  Stratford  Canning,  whose  service  to  the  cause  of 
religious  liberty  and  of  Turkish  missions  through  all  these 
dark  years  makes  his  name  forever  honored,  extorted  a  written 
pledge  from  the  sultan  that  henceforth  no  person  should  be 
executed  in  Turkey  because  of  his  religious  opinions.  Hailed 
at  the  time  as  a  real  charter  of  religious  hberty,  and  with  its 
issuance  regarded  almost  as  a  miracle,  this  pledge  was  found 
to  have  but  little  immediate  effect,  being  followed  at  first  by 
increased  persecution. 

The  new  patriarch  had  once  himself  leaned  toward  the 
EvangeUcals.  Now  his  office  turned  him  the  other  way,  and 
in  the  reaction  he  used  all  his  ingenuity  to  destroy  them. 
Armenians  in  business  found  their  shops  boycotted;  teachers 
and  priests  were  banished;  men  and  women  were  stoned  on 
the  streets,  hung  up  by  the  thumbs,  spat  upon  and  smitten 
in  the  face,  tortured  with  the  bastinado,  thrown  into  prison 
without  open  charge  or  trial.  Spies  were  everywhere.  Even 
at  the  interior  stations  the  strong  arm  of  the  oppressor  was 
felt.  Many  recanted  or  fell  back  into  secret  discipleship. 
Others  grew  the  bolder  and  developed  in  Christian  character. 


REENTERING  BIBLE  LANDS  105 

A  noble  witness  was  borne  by  many;  in  some  quarters  the 
gospel  never  made  so  much  progress  as  during  the  period 
of  these  outrages.  The  touring  missionaries  met  inquirers 
everywhere. 

Finding  that  all  his  efforts  to  suppress  the  reformation  were 
futile,  and  that  it  was  even  spreading  under  his  eyes,  the 
Excommu-  patriarch  resorted  at  last  to  the  ban  of  excommuni- 
nication  at  cation.  Twice  during  1846,  in  the  patriarchal 
Last  church  in  Constantinople,  with  the  house  darkened 

and  veil  drawn  in  front  of  the  altar,  a  bull  of  excommunica- 
tion was  read  against  the  Evangelicals,  and  every  vile  and 
cruel  epithet  heaped  upon  them.  This  edict,  it  was  ordered, 
should  be  read  annually  in  all  the  Armenian  churches  through- 
out the  empire. 

Cast  out  from  their  ecclesiastical  organization  and  thus  also 
deprived  of  their  political  rights,  the  wretched  people  were 
without  any  protection,  until,  upon  the  protest  of  the  great 
powers,  the  grand  vizier  himself  came  to  their  rehef.  The 
officer  appointed  to  safeguard  them,  when  they  appeared 
before  him,  refused  to  receive  them  simply  as  Armenians; 
they  could  no  longer  claim  either  the  religious  or  political 
rights  of  that  community.  It  was  "Protestants"  whose  shops 
he  was  to  protect.  So  the  name  which  they  never  had  taken 
was  given  to  them  and  became  henceforth  their  official  designa- 
tion. The  Church  which  drove  them  out  made  them  a  sep- 
arate people  and  styled  them  Protestants. 

There  was  no  recourse  now  but  to  organize  a  new  church, 
and  these  excommunicated  Christians  at  once  applied  to  the 
First  missionaries  for  help.     After  careful  consultation  a 

Protestant  plan  was  drawn  up  for  the  organization  of  the  First 
Church  Evangelical  Armenian  Church  in  Constantinople, 
Organized,  and  on  the  first  day  of  July,  1846,  that  church  was 
^  ^  publicly  recognized.    Its  Armenian  members,  thirty- 

seven  men  and  three  women,  rising  to  declare  their  assent  to 
the  plan,  confession,  covenant,  and  rules,  the  missionaries  and 


106  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

other  friends  then  rose,  as  representatives  of  Protestant  evan- 
geUcal  churches,  and  pubHcly  acknowledged  them  as  a  true 
church  of  Jesus  Christ.  Churches  on  the  same  broad  basis 
of  evangehcal  Christianity,  without  denominational  bonds, 
were  soon  formed  at  Nicomedia,  Adabazar,  and  Trebizond. 
These  churches  then  organized  themselves  into  evangelical 
associations  or  unions,  which  directed  the  affairs  of  the 
churches,  even  ordaining  ministers  and  preachers,  and  in  which 
the  missionaries  themselves  had  no  vote. 

Now  that  the  movement  was  open  and  recognized,  it  advanced 
yet  faster.  The  seminary  at  Bebek  developed  into  a  theo- 
Spread  of  logical  school;  a  boarding-school  for  young  women, 
Evangeli-  opened  at  Pera  in  1845,  began  to  send  out  its  trained 
calism  graduates  for  various  forms  of  service.     By   1848 

a  thousand  Armenians  had  separated  from  the  old  Church; 
thousands  more  were  friendly  to  the  new  movement.  Work 
had  been  begun  in  such  far  places  as  Aintab,  Aleppo,  and 
Arabkir.  In  many  centers  the  most  alert  and  enlightened  of 
the  community  were  waiting  to  hear  more  of  the  gospel  and 
its  message  of  spiritual  freedom. 

Persecution  did  not  cease  at  once  upon  the  separation  of 
the  Evangelicals.  Indeed,  conditions  were  almost  insupport- 
able when,  in  1847,  the  grand  vizier,  by  renewed  pressure, 
issued  a  firman  acknowledging  the  new  Protestant  community, 
and  according  to  it  all  the  rights  of  other  communities  in  the 
empire.  These  rights  were  strengthened  and  given  authority 
in  1850,  when  the  sultan  himself  granted  a  new  charter  to  the 
Protestants,  recognizing  and  confirming  all  that  had  been 
done  before.  They  were  now  able  to  choose  their  own  political 
head  to  represent  them  at  the  Porte,  to  manage  their  affairs, 
and  to  conduct  their  rites  of  worship  under  imperial  protection. 

To  the  founders  of  the  Turkish  Mission  it  must  often 
Looking  have  seemed  that  progress  was  pitifully  slow. 
Backward  Yet  those  who  looked  back  after  one  generation 
had   reason   to    marvel    and    to    give    praise    at    what    had 


ELIAS    RIGGS 

Greece,  1833-1838 
Turkey,  1838-1901 


ALDIN    GROUT 

South  Africa, 
1835-1870 


MIRON    WINSLOW 

CeyloT},  1820 
Madras,  1836-1864 


FIDELIA    FISKE 

Persia,  1843-1858 


WILLIAM    GOODELL 

Turkey,  1823-1865 


JUSTIN    PERKINS 

Persia,  1834-1869 


PETER    PARKER 

China,  1834-1857 


REPRESENTATIVE   MISSIONARIES    (Earlier) 


REENTERING  BIBLE  LANDS  107 

been  already  accomplished.  For  by  this  time  there  were 
five  missions  estabhshed,  two  of  them  reaching  far  into  the 
interior  and  dealing  with  races  almost  unknown  at  the  begin- 
ning. Eleven  stations  were  occupied,  with  sixty-four  mission- 
aries, counting  both  men  and  women,  and  with  more  than 
thirty  native  helpers.  There  were  churches  of  native  dis- 
ciples in  all  these  missions;  schools  of  higher  and  lower  grade, 
whose  graduates  were  going  forth  all  through  the  land;  busy 
presses  were  sending  forth  a  varied  Hterature,  and  nearly 
every  race  and  religion  in  this  composite  empire  had  come  in 
contact  with  the  new  teaching.  Turkey  was  fairly  astir  with 
the  influence  of  the  missionaries. 

And  what  men  they  were  !  Of  the  Turkish  Mission,  as  of 
the  founders  of  all  the  early  missions  of  the  Board,  it  is  to  be 
said  that  there  were  giants  in  those  days.  It  was  with  the 
missionaries  to  Turkey  and,  in  particular,  the  group  at  Con- 
stantinople in  mind,  that  the  Earl  of  Shaftesbury  later  said: 
*'I  do  not  believe  in  the  history  of  diplomacy,  or  in  the  history 
of  any  negotiations  carried  on  between  man  and  man,  we  can 
find  anything  equal  to  the  wisdom,  the  soundness,  and  the 
pure  evangehcal  truth  of  the  body  of  men  who  constitute  this 
mission." 


Chapter  VI 

EDGING   INTO  CHINA 

Robert    Morrison    summoned    the    American    Board    to 

China  in  1828.     His  appeal  was  backed  by  Americans  engaged 

in  the   Canton   trade,    who   laid   special   emphasis 

r.\   ^  '      upon  the  number  of  English-speaking  merchants  and 

seamen  that  might  be  reached  in  the  ports.     The 

open  preaching  of  the  gospel  was  for]:)idden,  but  it  was  thought 

that  much  could  be  done  through  private  conversation  and 

the  distribution  of  books. 

This  call  came  to  the  Board  at  a  favorable  time.  The  mis- 
sions already  undertaken  were  now  fairly  under  way  and 
encouraged  new  ventures.  And  China  was  an  appealing  land. 
Her  huge  size,  the  uncounted  multitudes  of  her  people,  the 
antiquity  of  her  civihzation,  her  need  of  an  uphfting  rehgion, 
all  challenged  the  eager  spirit  of  Christian  conquest.  The 
very  failure  of  earher  missionary  efforts,  of  the  Nestorian 
Church  in  the  sixth  century,  and  of  the  Jesuits  following 
Xavier  in  the  sixteenth,  prompted  a  new  attempt,  as  China 
was  beginning  to  open  a  little  to  western  influences,  to  sow 
the  seeds  of  divine  truth  in  this  stubborn  soil. 

When,  in  1829,  a  Canton  merchant  offered  to  provide  passage 
for  a  missionary  and  to  support  him  for  a  year,  the  Board 
Mission  determined  to  start  its  enterprise  in  China.  The 
Begun,  two  pioneers  were  Rev.  Elijah  C.  Bridgmah  and 
1830  Rev.    David   Abeel,   the   latter   appointed   by   the 

American  Seaman's  Friend  Society,  but  soon  after  his  arrival 
in  China  becoming  a  missionary  of  the  Board,  in  whose  service 
the  rest  of  his  years  were  spent.  The  newcomers  joined  Dr. 
Morrison  at  Canton  in  February,  1830.     Abeel  at  once  took 

108 


EDGING   INTO   CHINA  109 

up  his  task  for  the  sailors  and  Bridgman  set  himself  to  acquire 
the  language. 

It  was  recognized  that  the  Chinese  were  a  reading  people 
and  much  influenced  by  books.  One  of  the  first  efforts  of 
Xhe  the  missionaries,  therefore,  was   to   prepare   books 

Opening  in  Chinese  and  to  distribute  them  among  the  people. 
of  Work  In  this  mission  the  school  was  the  slowest  to  develop 
and  the  last  agency  to  come  to  importance.  The  Chinese  were 
too  well  satisfied  \^'ith  their  own  classics  to  have  am-  respect 
for  the  learning  of  other  lands.  And  as  official  place  and  honors 
were  secured  through  their  national  system  of  examinations, 
they  were  slow  to  send  their  children  to  mission  schools.  But 
everv-where  the  missionaries  went  on  their  tours  they  found  a 
ready  call  for  books  and  tracts.  The  gift  of  a  printing  outfit, 
called  the  Bruin  Press,  m  memory-  of  the  pastor  of  the  Bleeker 
Street  Church,  New  York,  equipped  the  mission  to  meet  this 
need,  while  the  arrival  of  S.  WeUs  WiUiams,  two  years  later, 
furnished  an  exceptionally  qualified  printer  and  author. 

The  a\'idit\^  of  the  Chinese  to  get  missionary  pubhcations 
did  not  necessarilj'  indicate  deep  interest  in  their  contents. 
^Ir.  WiUiams,  at  the  close  of  the  first  decade,  found  no  proof 
that  the  thousands  of  books  scattered  among  the  Chinese 
people  had  interested  one  mind  to  inquire  carefull}-  concerning 
their  contents.  A  pubhcation  that  did  prove  effective  was 
the  Chinese  Repository,  a  monthh'  begun  with  the  start  of 
the  mission,  under  Dr.  Bridgman's  editorship,  and  designed 
to  spread  information  about  China  among  present  and  pro- 
spective supporters  of  the  mission. 

Another  feature  of  the  Board's  opening  work  in  China  was 
its  quick  use  of  the  medical  agency.  Dr.  Peter  Parker,  commg 
The  Medi-  out  in  1834,  was  the  first  distinctively  medical  mis- 
cal  Arm,  sionar}'  ever  sent  to  the  field  by  any  American  or 
^834  English-speaking  society.     The  influence  of  his  hos- 

pital in  ■finning  attention  and  good-wiU  was  of  large  impor- 
tance.    Within  the  first  five  vears  it  was  estimated  that  from 


no    STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

20,000  to  30,000  people  entered  its  doors,  6000  of  them 
patients.  Often  patients  came  from  places  distant  400  or  500 
miles,  many  of  them  being  persons  of  rank  and  influence,  so 
that  the  good  name  of  the  hospital  and  its  missionary  was 
spread  over  a  wide  region.  By  keeping  a  few  Chinese  pupils 
always  under  his  care.  Dr.  Parker  made  the  hospital  practically 
a  medical  training-school,  from  which  men  went  forth  to  imitate 
his  methods  and  to  repeat  his  teaching  wherever  they  located. 
So  far  did  his  influence  go  toward  breaking  down  prejudice 
and  gaining  attention  that  there  was  as  much  truth  as  wit 
in  the  current  epigram  that  he  '' opened  China  to  the  mis- 
sionaries at  the  point  of  a  lancet." 

Among  the  helpful  influences  in  the  day  of  beginnings  was 
the  support  of  such  organizations  as  the  British  and  Foreign 
Bible  Society,  the  Society  for  the  Diffusion  of  Useful  Knowledge, 
and  locally,  the  Morrison  Education  Society,  formed  at  Canton 
by  merchants  friendly  to  the  spread  of  Christianity. 

Despite  all  this  activity,  it  was  hard  to  see  that  any  progress 
was  being  made.  After  three  years,  Bridgman  wrote  home: 
"Were  it  not  for  the  exceeding  great  and  precious 
p     ^^  promises,   my  heart  would  fail  me  —  the  work  is 

so  great,  so  vast,  and  the  laborers  so  few  and  feeble. 
We  are  as  nothing.  I  am  not  discouraged,  my  brother;  I  am 
not  disheartened;  but  I  am  often,  as  now,  sad.  To  see  so 
much  to  be  done  and  so  little  doing  makes  my  heart  ache. 
The  prospect  all  around  is  very  dark." 

The  truth  is  that  in  the  '30s  China  was  not  really  open 
to  foreign  influence,  even  in  her  port  cities.  Nothing  could  be 
done  publicly  or  as  recognized  missionary  work.  Though  the 
common  people  were  interested,  or  at  least  curious,  the  govern- 
ment was  very  jealous  of  foreigners,  and  ready  often  to  issue 
imperial  edicts  against  them.  They  could  not  reside  on  Chinese 
territory,  or  establish  Christian  schools,  or,  in  the  interior,  even 
distribute  tracts.  The  Hong  merchants,  or  guild  of  native 
magnates  at  Canton,  who  held  the  right  to  deal  with  foreign 


EDGING   INTO   CHINA  111 

traders,  were  the  willing  tool  of  the  East  India  Company  when 
it  opposed  missionaries  in  China  as  it  had  done  in  India. 

In  the  summer  of  1834  political  disturbances  growing  out 
of  the  opium  controversy  drove  Mr.  Bridgman  from  Canton, 
scattered  his  class  of  seven  promising  boys,  stopped  the  work 
of  the  press  through  the  imprisonment  of  the  native  printers, 
and  compelled  a  temporary  change  of  base  to  Macao,  the 
printing  establishment  at  the  same  time  being  transferred  to 
Singapore,  then  a  promising  center  for  several  missionary 
societies.  Macao  furnished  a  safe  retreat  where  Christian 
work  could  be  done  quietly,  especially  by  visiting  the  Chinese 
boats.  It  was  also  a  convenient  depot  from  which  publica- 
tions could  be  poured  into  China  as  fast  as  they  could  be 
printed. 

During  this  time  of  partial  interruption  and  waiting  several 
voyages  of  missionary  exploration  were  undertaken.  Under 
Tours  of  the  lead  of  Mr.  Gutzlaff,  an  intrepid  pioneer  of  a 
Explora-  German  society,  Mr.  Stevens  and  others  made  a 
tion,  1836  voyage  up  the  Min  River  in  1836  to  visit  the  tea 
plantations  of  Fuhkien.  After  proceeding  for  some  time  with- 
out molestation  they  were  fired  upon  by  soldiers  and  obliged 
to  retreat. 

Another  important  voyage  took  Mr.  Stevens  and  a  repre- 
sentative of  the  London  Missionary  Society  as  far  as  Shan- 
tung. A  cargo  of  about  20,000  volumes  of  religious  books 
and  tracts  was  distributed  by  these  missionaries,  who, 
spending  their  nights  on  the  boat,  by  day  ventured  far  ashore, 
with  no  guides  and  entirely  unarmed.  This  was  the  first 
missionary  excursion  ever  made  along  the  Chinese  coast  in  a 
vessel  which  did  not  carry  opium,  and  the  expense  of  the 
uncommercial  venture  was  shared  by  a  business  house  in 
Canton,  the  London  Missionary  Society,  and  the  British  and 
Foreign  Bible  Society. 

A  third  voyage  of  inquiry  was  undertaken  to  Yedo,  as  the 
capital  of  Japan  was  then  called.     Its  ostensible  purpose  was  to 


112  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

return  some  shipwrecked  Japanese  saitors;  its  real  object  was  to 
discover  whether  it  would  be  possible  to  undertake  missionary 
work  in  that  empire.  In  this  party  were  Dr.  Parker  and  Mr. 
Wilhams  as  well  as  the  explorer  Gutzlaff.  Being  neither  war- 
ship nor  trading  vessel,  this  craft  was  no  sooner  seen  in  the 
bay  of  Yedo  than  she  was  cannonaded  and  forced  to  put  to 
sea.  At  a  more  southern  port,  where  no  Europea,n  vessel 
had  ever  been  seen,  there  was  a  friendly  welcome  at  first,  but 
after  a  few  days  here  also  the  visitor  was  fired  upon.  It  is 
not  to  be  forgotten,  however,  that  one  of  the  earliest  visits 
of  a  foreign  vessel  to  the  ports  of  Japan  was  made  through 
the  bounty  of  Christian  merchants  and  the  courage  of 
Christian  missionaries  seeking  an  entrance  for  the  gospel  of 
Christ. 

Notwithstanding  the  barriers  in  their  way,  the  missionaries 
kept  bravely  to  their  task,  and  rejoiced  over  such  encourage- 
The  Mis-  ments  as  they  could  find:  a  few  Chinese  were  clear- 
sionaries'  ing  their  houses  of  idols;  street  chapels,  ever  one 
Patience  of  the  distinguishing  features  of  evangehstic  work 
in  China,  were  now  being  used  with  effect;  Dr.  Parker's  medical 
ministry  was  winning  increasing  favor. 

Instead  of  berating  the  people  who  treated  them  so  coldly 
and  remained  so  immovable  to  their  appeals,  the  missionaries 
were  inchned  rather  to  extenuate  their  hostile  attitude.  The 
friends  at  home  should  realize  how  the  Chinese  had  been 
trained  to  look  upon  all  foreigners  as  barbarians  and  upon 
themselves  as  infinitely  superior  to  other  peoples  in  knowledge 
and  ability.  How  would  an  American  Christian  feel  if  a 
despised  native  of  the  South  Seas  should  confront  him  with 
the  assertion  that  his  religion  was  vain,  his  prophets  impostors, 
and  his  hopes  without  foundation?  The  Chinaman's  immemo- 
rial scorn  of  the  foreigner  must  be  overcome  before  his  heart 
could  be  won  to  the  foreigner's  faith. 

So  these  patient  men  set  themselves  to  go  about  quietly  in 
shops  and  market-places,  along  the  roadways  and  in  the  fields, 


EDGING  INTO  CHINA  113 

to  enter  into  conversation  with  whoever  would  listen,  take 
advantage  of  such  curiosity  about  western  manners  as  might 
form  an  introduction,  turn  the  talk  if  possible  to  the  modes 
and  objects  of  worship,  and  then  declare  the  principles  and 
precepts  of  Christianity,  going  over  and  over  them  as  oppor- 
tunity served.  '^We  must  know  the  people,"  again  they  say, 
'^and  they  us.  There  must  be  mutual  respect,  esteem,  regard, 
and  even  love.  Notwithstanding  all  their  vices,  we  must 
love  them  —  yes,  even  love  them,  while  we  abhor  their  evil 
practises." 

In  1840  a  war  broke  out  in  China  which  for  a  time  prac- 
tically stopped  missionary  operations  there.  It  had  been  long 
impending.  The  damage  which  opium  was  doing  to 
^  g  China  was  too  evident  and  too  serious  to  be  allowed 
without  a  struggle.  The  ravage  of  the  drug  was  to 
be  seen  in  the  countless  sallow  faces  and  emaciated  forms,  in 
the  increasing  poverty  of  multitudes  of  families,  and  in  the 
dulled  mind  and  deadened  heart  of  this  nation  of  opium 
smokers. 

The  Chinese  government,  realizing  the  danger,  was  striving 
in  its  clumsy  and  ineffective  way  to  stop  the  importation  of 
the  drug,  while  the  profits  of  the  shameful  traffic  which  the 
East  India  Company  had  promoted  led  England  to  enforce 
its  continuance.  The  missionaries  held  their  ground  during 
the  war  as  best  they  could.  Dr.  Parker  taking  the  opportunity 
to  visit  England  and  America  in  the  interests  of  the  Medical 
Missionary  Society  which  had  been  formed  at  Macao.  When 
at  length  the  English  had  penetrated  into  the  very  heart  of 
the  empire  and  invested  the  ancient  capital  at  Nanking,  a 
new  treaty  was  signed  there  in  August,  1842,  which  forced 
China  to  allow  the  further  debauching  of  her  people. 

The  one  bright  feature  for  the  missionaries  in  the  new  adjust- 
ments was  that  five  principal  ports  were  now  opened  to  the 
world.  Canton,  Amoy,  Foochow,  Ningpo,  and  Shanghai. 
Hong  Kong  was  ceded  to  Great  Britain.     China's  exclusive- 


114  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

ness  and  self-confidence  received  a  jolt;  both  commerce  and 
missions  were  now  to  have  a  freer  hand.  At  once  the  matter 
of  enlargement  was  taken  up  and  the  missionaries  who  had 
been  working  at  long  range  in  the  outposts  and  islands  of  the 
far  East  found  that  at  last  the  hour  had  come  when  they  might 
press  into  China. ^ 

The  American  Board  had  made  several  efforts  to  secure  a 
foothold  on  the  outskirts  of  China.     In  1831  Mr.  Abeel  visited 
Java,   stopping   at   Batavia  for  the  study  of  the 
g     '  Fuhkien  dialect  of  the  Chinese  language,  the  form 

most  used  in  the  Indian  Archipelago  and  Siam. 
The  indefatigable  Gutzlaff  had  crossed  to  Bangkok  from 
Singapore  in  1828,  and  had  sent  an  earnest  appeal  to  America 
to  occupy  that  field.  Abeel  went  over  to  join  him  with  a 
view  to  starting  a  mission,  but  his  stay  was  short.  A  little 
later  the  American  Board  sent  four  more  missionaries  to  Siam, 
including  Dr.  D.  E.  Bradley  and  Rev.  Jesse  Caswell.  Dr. 
Bradley  brought  a  press  and  type  from  Singapore  and  work 
was  now  pushed.  It  seemed  at  first  that  a  great  impression 
was  being  made;  the  missionaries  were  visited  by  all  races 
and  classes,  and  the  demand  for  books  by  Siamese,  Chinese, 
Burmans,  and  Malays  constantly  increased.  The  Prudential 
Committee  was  so  much  encouraged  that  they  determined  to 
send  reenforcements  to  this  field.  The  claim  of  the  whole 
far  East  was  now  deeply  felt. 

The  situation  in  Siam  was  a  new  one  for  the  Board's  mis- 
sionaries. The  lands  so  far  entered  had  been  either  without 
any  strongly  organized  religion  or  they  had  been  so  restrained 
by  foreign  powers  as  not  to  feel  free  in  persecuting  mission- 
aries. But  in  Siam  they  dealt  with  an  independent  govern- 
ment whose  rule  was  bound  up  with  a  state  religion,  and  that 
one  of  the  most  complex  in  the  non-Christian  world.  Bud- 
dhism confronted  Christianity  here  with  a  priesthood,  proud, 
intolerant,  and  crafty. 

^  The  narrative  of  this  mission  is  resumed  on  page  119. 


EDGING   INTO   CHINA  115 

The  government  located  the  missionaries  in  Bangkok;  they 
must  not  go  outside  it  among  the  country  people.  Thus  they 
were  shut  off  from  the  Laos  country  on  the  north,  which  has 
Located  since  proved  a  most  responsive  and  encouraging 
and  at  field.     At  the  time  the  missionaries  did  not  greatly 

Work  mind  the    restriction.     For  the  Siamese    came    to 

visit  Bangkok  much  as  the  Jews  used  to  go  up  to  Jerusalem 
for  worship.  So  if  the  gospel  could  not  be  carried  to  them, 
they  came  within  the  hearing  of  it.  The  islanders  showed 
themselves  a  mild  people,  not  stupid,  but  slow  to  accept  new 
ways.  A  large  proportion  of  the  population  was  Chinese,  and 
missionary  work  was  divided  between  the  two  races. 

Here,  as  in  China,  efforts  to  found  schools  met  with  small 
success;  the  Siamese  especially  cared  little  for  them,  for  the 
reason  that  the  Siamese  government  gave  its  young  men  free 
instruction  in  connection  with  the  wats  or  temples.  As  boats 
came  to  the  harbor  of  Bangkok  from  every  quarter  of  the 
kingdom,  a  way  was  found  through  them  to  scatter  the  gospel 
message  widely. 

Dr.  Bradley's  medical  skill  soon  gave  him  access  to  the 
royal  circle.  What  made  him  famous  was  his  fight  against 
Winning  smallpox.  Though  recognizing  the  hazard  of  it. 
Royal  Dr.  Bradley  undertook  to  stay  the  disease  by  inocula- 

Favor  ^jon.     The  attempt  was  successful  and  saved  thou- 

sands of  lives.  When  practised  upon  the  royal  family  the 
king  approved  the  treatment  and  sent  the  royal  physicians 
to  be  trained  by  Dr.  Bradley.  So  marked  was  the  favor  of 
the  court  toward  the  missionaries  that  it  seemed  almost  as  if 
the  king  would  recognize  their  religion  as  better  than  his  own. 

At  the  same  time  Mr.  Caswell  was  making  a  friend  of  the 
heir  apparent,  who  was  being  trained  as  a  Buddhist  priest. 
Becoming  his  tutor,  Mr.  Caswell  so  influenced  him  that  when 
he  came  to  the  throne  he  showed  still  greater  friendliness 
toward  missionaries  and  toward  western  civilization.  It  was 
due  to  the  influence  of  these  missionary  pioneers  upon  the 


116  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

royal  house  of  Siam  that  its  rule  has  been  notably  just  and 
pubhc-spirited  for  an   oriental  court. 

The  direct  results  of  mission  work  were  nevertheless  few 
and  not  encouraging.  The  number  of  converts  was  very 
Transfer  of  small;  schools  did  not  grow;  the  demand  for  books 
the  Mis-  and  tracts  slackened.  After  a  dozen  years  there 
sion,  1850  was  only  one  Siamese  member  of  the  church,  and 
he  was  suspended  for  a  time;  of  the  three  Chinese  members, 
one  had  gone  to  China,  one  had  been  made  an  assistant  to  the 
mission,  and  of  the  third  it  had  to  be  said  "he  does  not 
run  well."  The  royal  favor  was  lost  for  a  while  to  the  mis- 
sion, apparently  under  the  influence  of  Buddhist  priests. 

When  the  close  of  the  Opium  War  gave  freer  access  to  China, 
it  seemed  better  to  transfer  the  work  for  the  Chinese  to  their 
own  country,  and  after  the  missionaries  who  were  laboring 
for  them  had  withdrawn,  it  became  more  and  more  evident 
how  little  grip  had  been  secured  on  the  Siamese.  At  this  time, 
too,  there  came  disagreement  among  the  members  of  the  mis- 
sion over  theological  questions,  Messrs.  Bradley  and  Caswell 
adopting  extreme  ''holiness"  or  "sinless  perfection"  views. 

In  view  of  all  these  adversities  and  the  appeal  for  enlarging 
work  in  China,  the  Board  in  1850  transferred  its  Siam  Mission 
to  the  American  Missionary  Association,  then  undertaking 
some  foreign  fields  of  missionary  work,  and  disposed  to  take 
up  this  enterprise,  at  the  same  time  accepting  the  two  mis- 
sionaries whose  views  had  led  to  their  withdrawal  from  the 
Board. 

Following  up  Abeel's  favorable  impression  of  Java  as  a 
mission  field,  the  Board  projected  another  of  its  extensive  and 
Exploring  systematic  tours  of  exploration.  Messrs.  Munson 
the  East  and  Lyman,  sent  out  in  1832  to  Java,  were  instructed 
Indies,  to  inquire  and  report  concerning  an}^  advantageous 

1833-34  points  for  beginning  work,  not  only  in  Java,  but  in 
other  islands  of  the  Indian  Archipelago.  It  was  understood  that 
throughout  this  group  the  shores  were  occupied  by  the  Malay 


EDGING   INTO  CHINA  117 

race;  the  interior  of  the  islands  was  said  to  be  peopled  by  men 
radically  different  from  the  Malays,  and  whose  languages, 
characters,  and  conditions  had  yet  to  be  learned.  Concerning 
these  unknown  peoples  and  the  missionary  opportunity  among 
them  these  explorers  were  in  particular  to  make  report. 

Upon  arrival  at  Batavia,  in  the  fall  of  1833,  the  missionaries 
settled  down  to  prepare  for  their  tour,  Munson  taking  up  the 
The  Tour  study  of  Chinese  and  Lyman  that  of  the  Malay 
of  Suma-  language.  Early  in  the  next  year  permission  was 
tra,  1834  granted  them  by  the  Netherlands  India  government 
to  visit  parts  of  Sumatra  and  Borneo  for  missionary  purposes. 
Landing  on  the  western  coast  of  Sumatra,  they  spent  several 
weeks  in  visiting  the  principal  towns  and  outlying  islands, 
feeling  their  way  along  with  due  regard  for  safety  and  oppor- 
tunity. 

At  last  they  felt  themselves  ready  for  their  journey  into  the 
interior,  to  the  wild  Batak  country.  Pushing  along  through 
the  tropical  jungle,  they  advanced  without  incident  for  several 
days,  until,  unsuspecting  any  trouble,  as  they  came  to  the 
small  village  of  Lobu  Pining,  they  were  set  upon  by  some  of 
its  warriors  and  struck  do\\Ti.  One  of  the  missionaries  was 
not  instantly  killed,  and  the  people  marked  how  he  knelt  in 
prayer  until  the  second  stroke  silenced  his  lips  forever.  The 
exceeding  pity  of  the  event  was  that  it  came  through  a  mis- 
understanding,  the  ignorant  islanders  associating  these  white 
men  with  some  who  had  visited  them  before,  and  who,  they 
thought,  were  responsible  for  a  subsequent  invasion  of  their 
land. 

When  they  had  once  struck,  the  Bataks  carried  the  deed 
through  to  the  horrible  end,  though  the  women,  who  had  begged 
that  the  visitors'  lives  be  spared,  refused  to  cook  the  cannibal 
feast.  The  bones  were  at  last  consigned  to  a  hole  where  refuse 
was  thrown,  and  which  was  marked  with  three  sticks.  One 
of  these  sticks  happened  to  be  a  green  twig,  which  took  root 
and  grew  until  it  now  covers  the  memorial  stone  which  marks 


118  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

the  martyrs'  grave.  Although  these  two  white  men  were 
never  able  to  utter  a  word  of  the  gospel  to  the  Bataks  in  that 
savage  day,  they  are  regarded  by  the  tens  of  thousands  of 
Christian  Bataks  now  as  the  real  founders  of  Christianity  in 
their  land. 

In  1836  another  group  of  missionaries  arrived  in  Java,  hoping 
to  carry  out  the  judgment  of  Abeel  by  founding  a  mission 
there.  The  government  delayed  answering  their 
g  ^^  request  so  that  they  could  not  even  explore  the 
island.  The  financial  panic  of  1837,  which  hurt  so 
many  mission  fields,  withheld  their  reenf  or  cements.  A  second 
attempt  to  enter  Sumatra,  while  awaiting  permission  to  locate 
in  Java,  was  foiled  by  a  war  in  the  Batak  country. 

At  last  the  Netherlands  India  government  announced  that 
the  missionaries  might  settle  in  Borneo,  but  nowhere  else 
within  its  jurisdiction.  The  delay  and  opposition  were  very 
disquieting  both  to  the  missionaries  and  to  the  Board.  It  had 
not  been  in  their  thought  to  locate  in  Borneo,  as  other  lands 
were  believed  to  be  more  promising,  but  since  this  was 
the  only  door  open  the  missionaries  entered  in  without  fal- 
tering. 

A  hurried  tour  across  Borneo  from  north  to  south  revealed 
the  task  ahead.  Clearly  it  was  to  be  a  difficult  field.  No  less 
Borneo  than  four  languages  would  have  to  be  acquired 
Mission  before  this  people  could  be  reached  and  only  one 
under  had  been  reduced  to  writing;  the  population  was 

Way,  1838  scattered;  the  blight  of  Mohammedanism  was  over 
a  part  of  the  field;  the  Dyaks  of  the  interior,  though  a  better 
race  than  the  Malays,  were  nothing  more  than  savages,  friendly 
when  in  peace,  but  bloodthirsty  and  barbarous  when  at 
war.  Six  men  seemed  an  insignificant  force  to  meet  such 
obstacles. 

With  fine  courage  the  missionaries  settled  to  their  task  on 
as  hard  a  field  as  was  anjrwhere  to  be  found.  By  their  per- 
sistence some  results  were  accomplished,  but  very  slowly  and 


EDGING   INTO   CHINA  119 

with  utmost  difficulty.  When  the  government  restrictions 
became  severer,  to  the  point  of  endangering  the  hfe  of  the 
mission,  and  protests  were  unavaihng,  the  missionaries  were 
inchned  to  leave  the  coast  and  go  to  the  Dyaks  in  the  interior. 
Those  who  had  been  laboring  especially  for  the  Chinese  in 
the  island  took  advantage  of  the  opening  of  the  Chinese 
ports  after  the  Opium  War  to  transfer  their  work  to  that 
empire . 

Despite  all  that  could  be  done,  the  Borneo  Mission  seemed 
to  lose  ground.  The  opposition  of  the  Malays  increased;  the 
Dyaks  were  indifferent;  the  field  was  felt  to  be  a  valley  of 
dry  bones.  Yet  the  loyal  missionaries  were  not  disposed  to 
withdraw.  They  appealed  to  their  brethren  of  the  Dutch 
Reformed  Church,  which  portion  of  the  Board's  constituency 
was  especially  providing  for  this  field,  to  send  reenforcements. 
But  no  helpers  came.  Efforts  were  made  to  get  men  from 
Switzerland  and  The  Netherlands,  but  in  vain.  At  last  the 
mission  fairly  died  out  for  lack  of  missionaries. 

This  was  a  disappointing  and  humbhng  experience;  but  as 
it  had  not  been  originally  intended  to  enter  Borneo,  and  as 
every  effort  had  been  made  to  develop  the  mission  there,  the 
Board  felt  justified  in  turning  to  more  promising  fields,  leaving 
the  evangelization  of  this  island  to  whoever  might  take  it  up 
or  to  the  opportunity  of  a  later  time. 

At  once,  upon  the  opening  of  Chinese  ports  to  foreign  resi- 
dents, the  Board  reached  out  to  get  a  stronger  hold  upon  the 
Enlarge-  empire.  The  very  year  of  the  new  treaty  (1842) 
ment  in  Dr.  Abeel,  accompanied  by  missionaries  of  the 
China  (See  American  Episcopal  Church,  made  a  trip  up  the 
p.  114)  coast  to  Amoy,  to  see  if  there  was  an  opening  there. 
A  hke  visit  was  made  by  Mr.  WilHams  to  Hong  Kong,  the  latter 
place,  which  as  a  result  of  the  war  had  leaped  from  a  barren 
island  to  a  substantial  city  under  British  rule,  being  occupied 
for  a  time  as  a  station.  But  experience  proving  that  it  was 
better  to  be  on  the  mainland  and  nearer  the  native  life,  the 


120  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

missionaries  returned  to  Canton  in  the  summer  of  1845.  Dr. 
Abeel's  visit  to  Amoy  resulted  in  his  settlement  there,  where 
Messrs.  Doty  and  Pohlman,  coming  over  from  Borneo,  were 
in  time  to  relieve  him,  when  by  failing  health  he  was  obhged 
to  return  to  the  United  States. 

The  work  of  a  busy  and  effective  mission  now  developed. 
The  daily  round  of  the  missionaries  included  an  hour  of  study 
with  a  teacher,  an  hour  of  meeting  with  other  missionaries  and 
native  teachers  for  translation  in  the  revising  of  the  Chinese 
New  Testament,  an  afternoon  largely  devoted  to  study,  closing 
with  public  worship,  and  followed  by  a  little  rest  and  outdoor 
exercise,  often  taking  the  form  of  a  walk  through  the  crowded 
streets  where  there  were  always  hundreds  ready  to  listen,  the 
day  ending  with  a  long  evening  of  writing  or  reading,  or  per- 
haps with  a  service  of  prayer. 

Meetings  for  women  soon  began  to  be  possible,  and  the 
opportunity  for  women  missionaries  was  evident.  Street 
chapels  increased  in  number  and  attractiveness  to  the  people. 
By  1848  a  church  building  was  erected,  and  in  1850  a  church 
was  organized,  a  mother  and  two  sons  being  baptized  and 
admitted  to  membership.  Their  cases  had  been  carefully 
watched  for  more  than  two  years,  and  the  day  of  their  ingath- 
ering was  a  red-letter  day  for  the  mission.  The  brethren  of 
the  London  Missionary  Society  omitted  their  service  to  join 
in  the  celebration.  Other  members  were  soon  added  to  this 
infant  church. 

The  mission  was  eager  to  extend  its  work  to  other  ports 
now  open,  and,  while  expecting  to  continue  at  Canton  and 
Hong  Kong,  was  looking  eagerly  to  the  north.  On  New 
Year's  Day,  1847,  Stephen  Johnson  arrived  at  Foochow, 
whither  he  had  been  deputed  with  Lyman  D.  Peet  to  open  a 
new  station.  Temporary  homes  were  secured  in  the  suburbs, 
from  which  the  city  could  be  reached  and  worked.  By  1850 
there  were  six  missionaries  in  residence  here,  and  the  school, 
publication,  and  preaching  departments  were  all  under  way. 


EDGING   INTO  CHINA  121 

The  patient  labor  of  the  missionaries  was  beginning  to  tell 
in  the  winning  of  respect  and  influence,  not  only  among  the 
common  people,  but  with  officials.  The  five  high 
Prestke  mandarins  of  Amoy  invited  the  missionaries  to  a 
feast;  the  viceroy  of  the  district,  on  his  triennial 
visit  to  the  city,  took  occasion  to  show  them  public  tokens  of 
regard;  when  the  Americans  went  abroad  they  were  uniformly 
treated  with  deference. 

Mr.  Bridgman's  labors  as  interpreter  for  Commodore  Kerney 
at  Canton  in  negotiating  the  treaty  of  1842,  and  Dr.  Parker's 
distinguished  service  as  secretary  of  the  United  States  Lega- 
tion, after  resigning  from  the  Board  to  accept  that  post  in 
1847,  are  but  more  conspicuous  examples  of  the  important  aid 
which  early  missionaries  in  China  rendered  in  bringing  the 
empire  into  touch  with  the  western  world.  *The  appearance 
in  1848  of  S.  Wells  Williams'  The  Middle  Kingdom  not 
only  increased  knowledge  and  interest  in  China,  but  inciden- 
tally added  to  the  reputation  of  the  Board's  workers  there.    . 

By  this  time  (1846)  the  standing  and  privileges  of  mission- 
aries in  the  empire  had  been  greatly  increased.  Three  suc- 
cessive treaties  had  each  been  of  advantage:  one  with  England 
had  secured  the  opening  of  the  five  ports;  one  with  America 
had  added  rights  and  privileges,  not  only  for  all  its  merchants, 
but  for  all  its  citizens  in  these  ports,  so  extending  those  rights 
as  to  include  the  founding  of  institutions  for  larger  missionary 
work;  a  third  treaty  with  France  added  the  rights  to  all  nations 
to  establish  schools  and  colleges,  to  buy  and  sell  foreign  as 
well  as  Chinese  books,  and  to  teach  foreign  as  well  as  Chinese 
languages.  The  way  seemed  now  to  be  opened  legally  for 
the  free  declaring  of  the  Word  of  God. 

Notwithstanding  this  enlargement  of  missionary  work  and 
Yet  Slow  the  freer  chance,  the  results  were  still  meager  and 
Progress  slow.  It  was  hard  to  get  the  people  to  comprehend 
new  ideas  even  when  they  seemed  to  understand  the  words. 
The  upper  and  even  the  middle  classes  were  incased  in  their 


122  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

national  pride;  at  first,  only  the  very  poorest  could  be 
reached. 

And  hostility  was  rife.  In  1846,  as  Dr.  Bridgman  was  dis- 
tributing books  in  the  doorway  of  a  street  chapel  in  Canton, 
a  tract  was  set  on  fire  and  hurled  in  his  face;  a  second  attempt 
was  made  to  burn  a  quantity  of  books  by  the  door,  but  the 
coolness  and  courage  of  the  missionary  prevailed  and  the  crowd 
retreated  at  length,  leaving  him  master  of  the  situation.  There 
was  a  good  deal  of  turbulence  in  those  days  when  treaties  were 
being  forced.  Foreigners  were  often  assaulted,  but  no  real 
injury  was  sustained. 

At  best  the  missionaries  were  not  able  to  make  such  impres- 
sion as  they  wished.  It  was  diflficult  for  them  to  appreciate  the 
native  mind;  their  crude  and  inelegant  speech,  from  the  stand- 
point of  Chinese  oratory,  impeded  their  message.  There  was 
desperate  need  of  a  native  agency,  which  so  far  was  not  avail- 
able. People  were  little  inclined  to  put  their  children  in  schools 
conducted  by  foreign  teachers.  Dr.  Ball  had  gathered  a  few 
scholars  into  a  school  in  Canton,  but  it  seemed  impossible  to 
start  a  seminary  for  training  native  workers,  and  even  in  1850 
there  was  no  material  for  forming  a  church  there.  The  moral 
condition  of  the  people  was  appallingly  low;  robbers,  pirates, 
and  murderers  were  plentiful,  even  in  Canton,  and  jails  were 
glutted.  The  inhumanity  of  the  people  was  most  discourag- 
ing; they  seemed  almost  insensible  to  the  wrongs  and  sufferings 
that  prevailed. 

As  we  look  back  to-day,  the  situation  at  the  close  of  that 
first  period  seems  dark  and  discouraging.  China  was  still 
practically  closed  to  the  gospel.  It  was  a  period  of  drilhng 
the  rock.  Yet  to  those  on  the  ground,  whose  memory  trav- 
ersed the  period,  it  seemed  that  much  had  been  gained.  Bridg- 
man's  words  in  1850  express  what  was  in  the  minds  of  all:  ''When 
the  beloved  Abeel  and  myself  arrived  here,  there  was,  in  all 
this  wide  field,  only  one  Protestant  missionary,  and  only  lim- 
ited access  to  the  people  at  one  port.     To  propagate  Chris- 


EDGING  INTO   CHINA  123 

tianity,  on  the  part  of  the  foreigner,  and  to  embrace  and  practise 
it,  on  the  part  of  the  native,  was  then  ahke,  in  either  case,  a 
capital  crime.  In  these  twenty  years  what  changes  have  we 
seen!  Morrison  and  Abeel  have  gone  to  their  rest,  and  many 
others  who  came  subsequently  to  China  are  also  gone;  yet 
nearly  a  hundred  laborers,  men  and  women,  preachers  and 
teachers  of  Jehovah's  blessed  gospel,  are  now  in  the  field;  and 
we  have  free  access  to  millions  of  the  people.  The  first  fruits 
of  a  great  and  glorious  harvest  begin  to  appear." 


Chapter  VII 

ATTEMPTING  AFRICA 

Africa  is  yet  called  the  dark  continent;  a  century  ago  it 

was  black  as  midnight.     Save  on  a  narrow  fringe  of  coast 

there  was  no  pretense  of  civilization.     Inland  stalked 

^.  ^\^  '  wild  beasts  and  naked  savages.  Its  shores  were 
dmg  Land 

fever-laden;  its  ports  cities  of  shame,  where  traders 

debauched  the  native  to  yet  lower  depths  of  brutality.  To 
the  traveler,  Africa  was  an  unknown  land;  for  missionary  resi- 
dence it  had  a  dismal  and  dangerous  look.  Yet  work  for 
Africa  was  projected  in  America  long  before  the  days  of  the 
American  Board.  So  early  as  1773  Rev.  Samuel  Hopkins, 
minister  of  an  influential  church  in  Newport,  then  a  center  of 
the  slave-trade,  with  his  neighbor.  Rev.  Ezra  Stiles,  afterward 
president  of  Yale  College,  secured  funds  and  organized  a 
society  to  educate  negroes  for  missionary  work  in  the  home- 
land of  their  race.  The  outbreak  of  the  Revolutionary  War 
put  a  stop  to  this  undertaking.  But  Africa  was  upon  the  heart 
of  the  men  of  the  Haystack,  and  it  was  on  returning  from  a 
tour  of  missionary  exploration  of  that  continent  that  Samuel 
Mills  met  his  death. 

At  its  annual  meeting  of  1825  the  American  Board  voted 
to  establish  a  mission  in  Africa  as  soon  as  the  Prudential  Com- 
mittee could  find  a  way.     Inquiries  were  thereupon 
j^  made  as  to  the  possibilities  on  the  northern,  western, 

and  eastern  coasts;  but  it  was  not  until  1833  that 
a  decisive  step  was  taken  toward  entering  the  continent. 
Then  John  Leighton  Wilson  and  a  college  classmate,  Stephen 
R.  Wyncoop,  joining  a  company  of  emigrants  going  out  under 

124 


ATTEMPTING  AFRICA  126 

the  Colonization  Society  of  Maryland,  undertook  a  tour  of 
investigation. 

Touching  at  Monrovia,  the  explorers  proceeded  along  the 
coast  for  300  miles  to  Cape  Palmas,  a  headland  on  the 
Guinea  coast,  which  they  fixed  upon  as  most  favorable  for 
the  establishment  of  a  mission,  the  cape  marking  the  divid- 
ing point  between  the  windward  and  leeward  coasts,  both  of 
which  might  easily  be  reached  from  this  base.  It  was  also 
considered  that  such  proximity  to  the  new  colony  would  be 
of  advantage. 

The  natives  here  were  found  at  the  lowest  grade  of  super- 
stition, and  those  in  the  interior  beyond  the  thick  forests  were 
said  to  be  of  the  same  character;  their  religion  was  so  vague 
and  undeveloped  it  seemed  as  if  it  could  not  be  hard  to 
displace.  Mohammedanism,  in  the  persons  of  the  school- 
master and  the  warrior,  was  advancing  rapidly  from  the  north. 
It  was  time  for  Christianity  to  preempt  the  ground.  There 
appeared  to  be  a  general  desire  for  schools,  and  a  good  location 
was  generously  offered  by  the  agent  of  the  colony.  The  spies 
brought  back  a  favorable  report. 

When  Mr.  Wilson  returned  to  Cape  Palmas  with  his  wife, 
near  the  close  of  1834,  they  were  met  with  a  hearty  welcome. 
Staking  The  framed  house  brought  out  the  year  before  had 
out  the  been  put  up  and  made  ready,  and  the  colonists  were 
Field  friendly  and  helpful.     The  natives,  too,  were  glee- 

ful over  their  arrival,  though  it  was  recognized  that  they  had 
so  little  conception  of  what  the  mission  wa6  for  that  their 
enthusiasm  did  not  count  for  much. 

The  missionaries  settled  resolutely  to  their  task.  Their 
purpose  was  not  to  develop  one  large  station  at  Cape  Palmas; 
rather  to  make  it  a  base  from  which  to  extend  a  line  of  stations 
inland.  From  the  first,  the  Board's  thought  had  turned  toward 
the  vast  interior  of  the  continent,  the  plan  being  to  advance 
from  the  Gold  Coast  to  the  country  of  the  Ashantees,  believed 
to  be  the  greatest  of  the  West  African  peoples,  and,  when  the 


126  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

Niger  should  be  opened,  to  press  on  toward  those  unknown 
but  rumored  highlands  of  Central  Africa.  The  vision  before 
the  eyes  of  the  founders  "was  as  magnificent  as  the  language 
in  which  they  phrased  it :  a  chain  of  missions,  planted  by  both 
American  and  European  societies,  with  such  wise  cooperation 
that  at  length  from  the  east  and  the  west,  from  the  north  and 
the  south,  their  representatives  should  meet  ''upon  some 
central  mountain  to  celebrate  in  lofty  praise  Africa's  redemp- 
tion." 

In  carrying  out  this  ambitious  plan  it  was  expected  that 
much  dependence  must  be  put  upon  pious  natives  and  colonists, 
so  that  a  training-school  seemed  of  immediate  importance  to 
prepare  teachers  and  catechists  for  the  advance.  A  boarding- 
school,  therefore,  was  begun  at  once  at  Cape  Palmas,  with 
fifteen  boys  and  four  girls  as  pupils,  and  more  applying  than 
could  be  received.  An  elementary  school  was  also  begun  by 
Mr.  Wilson,  in  anticipation  of  the  time  when  it  could  be 
turned  over  to  native  teachers.  As  soon  as  knowledge  of  the 
language  permitted,  a  schoolbook  was  prepared  and  preaching 
started.  Soon  a  mission  church  was  organized,  to  which  new 
members  were  gradually  added,  eight  being  received  during 
the  third  year  of  the  mission. 

At  length  reenforcements  made  possible  a  second  station, 
ten  miles  away,  and  provided  a  printer.  Day  and  evening 
schools  were  now  in  operation,  and  the  boarding-school  had 
fifty  pupils.  Prejudice  against  the  training  of  girls  was  sub- 
siding. A  few  Christian  homes  appeared  with  the  marriage 
of  those  who  had  been  associated  in  the  schools.  Encouraging 
inroads  were  made  on  the  gross  superstition  of  the  people,  and 
the  influence  of  fetish  men  was  plainly  diminishing.  It  being 
the  general  belief  that  if  they  fell  or  were  thrown  into  sea  water, 
they  would  lose  their  satanic  power,  the  people  at  one  of  the 
outstations,  with  shouting  and  general  rejoicing,  cast  eight  of 
them  into  the  surf,  threatening  others  with  similar  treatment 
if  their  actions  did  not  suit  the  crowd.     Unhappily,  it  could 


ATTEMPTING   AFRICA  127 

not  be  said  that  '^pure  religion  and  undefiled"  was  taking  the 
place  of  these  abandoned  superstitions. 

Careful  tours  were  now  undertaken  along  both  the  Gold 
and  the  Ivory  Coasts  and  into  the  interior,  inviting  fields  being 
A  Disap-  discovered  in  all  directions,  if  only  there  were 
pointed  laborers  to  occupy  them.  The  appeal  for  reenforce- 
Hope  ments  grew  intenser,  and  the  temper  of  the  Board 

toward  this  mission  became  so  enthusiastic  that  while  call 
was  made  only  for  seven  or  eight  workers,  it  was  declared 
there  were  locations  for  a  hundred  and  that  Central  Africa, 
if  vigorously  approached,  would  be  found  open  to  Chris- 
tianity. 

But  no  such  number  of  new  missionaries  could  be  secured, 
and  of  those  that  did  come,  almost  all  were  stricken  with 
sickness,  several  unto  death.  The  menace  of  the  malarial 
climate  depressed  even  these  devoted  men  and  women,  and 
as  it  fell  out,  if  there  had  been  more  volunteers,  they  would 
hardly  have  been  sent.  For  that  commercial  panic  of  1837 
which  wrought  havoc  on  all  the  Board's  fields  was  particu- 
larly disastrous  in  the  Cape  Palmas  Mission.  It  became  neces- 
sary to  close  schools  and  dismiss  teachers,  one-half  of  the 
boarding  scholars  in  the  seminary  being  sent  away. 

Here,  as  in  Ceylon,  the  effect  of  this  action  upon  the  natives 
was  altogether  harmful.  In  their  ignorance  they  could  not 
understand  the  reason  for  the  mission's  financial  embarrass- 
ment and  misinterpreted  it.  It  was  rumored  that  the  mis- 
sionaries had  been  discredited  at  home  and  that  they  were  to 
be  recalled.  To  avoid  being  caught  in  the  impending  disgrace, 
parents  withdrew  their  children  from  those  schools  that  were 
still  open.  This  retrenchment  came,  too,  at  a  time  when  the 
first  interest  in  the  mission  was  waning  and  the  natives  were 
showing  signs  of  reaction  against  its  serious  purpose.  Thus 
the  attendance  fell  off  at  preaching  services,  the  activity  of 
press  and  school  lessened,  and  the  entire  work  of  the  mission 
seriously    lagged.      To    make   matters   worse,    troubles   arose 


128  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN   BOARD 

with  the  adjacent  colony;  there  were  frequent  collisions  between 
natives  and  colonists,  and  the  latter  began  to  show  some  jeal- 
ousy of  the  missionaries. 

In  view  of  all  these  hindrances,  and  because  it  had  never 
been  intended  to  make  Cape  Palmas  the  chief  location  of  the 
mission  or  to  remain  permanently  at  the  coast,  it  was  decided 
to  seek  a  better  position  from  which  to  start  that  line  of  mis- 
sions with  which  the  continent  was  to  be  girdled.  After  a 
voyage  of  discovery,  the  new  station  was  planted  on  the  nearer 
side  of  the  Gaboon  River,  twenty  miles  north  of  the  equator. 
Two  of  the  Cape  Palmas  stations  were  now  transferred  to 
American  Episcopal  missionaries,  and  the  Board's  force,  includ- 
ing several  native  members  of  the  Cape  Palmas  church,  removed 
to  the  new  location. 

Work  was  here  begun  under  more  favorable  auspices.  Two 
stations  were  located,  with  the  approval  of  King  Glass,  the 
Opening  main  one  at  his  town  eight  miles  from  the  mouth 
the  Gaboon  of  the  river.  Though  this  region  seemed  not  so 
Mission,  densely  populated  as  that  of  Cape  Palmas,  the 
1843  Mpongwe  people,  who  dwelt  here,  appeared  more 

advanced  in  civilization  than  any  others  so  far  found  on  the 
western  coast  of  Africa.  Their  language  was  surprisingly  per- 
fect, far  pleasanter  to  the  ear  and  more  facile  for  use  than  the 
rougher  tongue  of  the  people  to  the  north.  With  slight  differ- 
ences in  dialect,  it  was  found  usable  along  two  hundred  miles 
of  seacoast. 

Schools  were  opened  at  once  with  a  good  number  of  pupils, 
the  king  himself  offering  one  of  his  own  houses  for  a  building. 
Soon  there  were  boarding-schools  both  for  girls  and  boys,  and 
five  other  schools  by  day  and  night  were  teaching  the  scholars 
who  came  eagerly  to  them.  A  church  was  organized  within 
a  year  by  Christian  natives  who  had  come  from  Cape  Palmas, 
and  by  the  next  year  there  were  nineteen  native  members  and 
there  had  been  one  Christian  marriage.  The  printing  press 
was  at   work  preparing  text-books,  hymn   books,   and  cate- 


ATTEMPTING  AFRICA  129 

chisms,  and  such  volumes  for  religious  culture  as  are  indicated 

by  the  titles,  Joseph  and  his  Brethren  and    The  Broad   and 

Narrow  Way. 

The  Gaboon  River  was  open  for  navigation  for  thirty  miles 

from  its  mouth.     The  banks  were  high,  the  water  excellent, 

and    trade    considerable.     The    missionaries    were 
PrGssiiifir 

eager  to  press  on  to  the  regions  beyond.     A  tour 

by  Mr.  Wilson  for  more  than  seventy  miles  from 

the  coast  brought  valuable  information  as  to  the  character  of 

the  inland  people,  in  particular  of  the  Pangwes,  who  were 

now  pushing  toward  the  coast,  to  the  alarm  of  the  maritime 

tribes.     Mr.  Wilson  was  much  impressed  with  the  appearance 

of  these  people,  the  noblest  race  of  savages  he  had  seen  in 

Africa.     The  impression  grew  that  in  the  unexplored  central 

regions  of  the  continent  would  be  found  peoples  much  superior 

to  those  who  had  been  crowded  out  to  the  coasts. 

While  the  change  of  the  mission  to  the  Gaboon  thus  brought 
fresh  courage  and  determination  to  the  missionaries,  their 
task  in  the  new  location  was  by  no  means  easy.  The  climate, 
though  an  improvement  on  Cape  Palmas,  still  was  that  of 
equatorial  Africa  and  of  the  coast.  Here,  too,  the  health  of 
the  missionaries  was  very  precarious,  and  the  ravage  of  sickness 
and  death  continually  depleted  the  ranks.  And  while  the 
native  people,  from  the  king  down,  were  friendly  and  tractable, 
the  missionaries  did  not  now  escape  the  adverse  influence  of 
foreigners.  One  of  the  first  discoveries  on  arrival  at  the  Gaboon 
was  the  appalling  fact  that  a  Spanish  factory  on  the  opposite 
side  of  the  river  was  maintaining  human  slavery. 

Soon  more  direct  troubles  came  from  a  gross  outrage  by 
representatives  of  France.  In  1844  the  French  government 
gained  permission  from  an  independent  chief  to 
Afferess'on  ^^^^^  ^  factory  on  the  Gaboon  River,  close  to  the 
mission  station.  At  first  it  was  feared  that  the 
factory  would  prove  to  be  a  fort  to  dominate  the  river.  A 
large  company  of  French  Catholic  missionaries  were  known  to 


130  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

be  in  training  at  Cape  Palmas,  and  it  was  surmised  that  a 
group  of  them  would  be  sent  to  the  Gaboon.  At  length,  with 
the  aid  of  a  jug  of  brandy  and  other  false  promises,  King  Glass 
was  induced  to  sign  what  proved  to  be  a  treaty  ceding  the 
sovereignty  of  his  dominions  to  Louis  Philippe,  thus  com- 
pelling the  missionaries  henceforth  to  look  for  protection  to 
the  king  of  France.  When  the  king  sobered  off  and  the  trick 
was  discovered,  there  was  loud  outcry.  But  the  deed  was 
done. 

Two  years  later,  dissatisfied  with  so  shady  a  title,  the  French 
government  sent  a  brig  of  war  to  bombard  the  town,  and, 
when  the  people  had  fled  to  the  bush,  to  take  possession.  Dur- 
ing the  fighting  the  mission  quarters  barely  escaped  destruc- 
tion, the  display  of  the  American  flag  seeming  only  the  more 
to  incense  the  French.  When  the  ship's  officers  had  restored 
order,  they  apologized  for  the  affront  to  the  mission  station, 
and  thereafter  courteous  relations  were  maintained  between 
the  missionaries  and  the  new  masters  of  the  land.  Perhaps  the 
favorable  attention  shown  to  the  Americans  by  the  naval 
officers  of  their  own  government  who  visited  the  Gaboon,  as 
the  southern  point  of  their  cruising  ground,  may  have  stimu- 
lated the  politeness  of  the  Frenchmen. 

The  anticipated  incursion  of  Roman  Catholics  came  to  pass 
when  they  also  transferred  their  station  from  Cape  Palmas 
to  the  Gaboon.  The  missionaries,  fearing  that  trouble  might 
arise,  were  now  minded  to  start  a  new  station  beyond  the 
jurisdiction  of  the  French,  where  the  Board's  mission  could 
rally  if  expelled  from  the  Gaboon. 

In  spite  of  these  new  burdens  and  perplexities,  the  mission- 
aries never  lost  heart.  They  felt  that  they  had  a  good  field 
for  labor,  and  that  they  were  getting  hold.  The 
Q  .,  ,  mass  of  the  people  already  showed  some  impress 
of  the  gospel,  and  the  schools,  if  irregular  in  their 
conduct,  were  furnishing  a  measure  of  instruction  to  large 
numbers  of   pupils,  adults  as  well   as  children.     The  climate 


ATTEMPTING  AFRICA  13^ 

here  was  at  least  no  worse  than  in  other  parts  of  Africa  where 
white  men  had  gone  in  the  interests  of  commerce.  So  the 
missionaries  appealed  for  reenforcements  and  continually 
looked  for  new  openings,  keeping  still  to  the  fore  the  primary- 
purpose  of  pressing  into  the  heart  of  the  continent. 

The  difficulties  in  attempting  to  advance  into  the  interior 
were  very  great.  Nowhere  were  there  roads;  once  the  rivers 
were  left,  the  traveler  found  only  a  narrow  path  through  dense 
forests.  And  there  were  no  caravans  or  traders;  the  people 
were  timid  guides.  Without  one  great  chieftain  or  established 
government,  there  was  only  warfare,  treachery,  and  savage 
jealousy  between  ail  the  inland  tribes. 

The  account  of  a  second  visit  of  the  missionaries  to  the 
Pangwe  people  indicates  how  exciting  were  some  of  these 
tours  among  the  unkno\vn  races  of  the  interior:  "When  we 
approached  the  shore,  tie  brow  of  the  hill  was  covered  with 
a  dark  tumultuous  throng,  shouting  and  gesticulating  in  the 
wildest  manner  imaginable.  When  we  landed,  all  the  women 
disappeared,  but  the  men  remained,  and  their  appearance  did 
not  belie  their  reputation.  It  is  said  that  they  never  fear 
the  face  of  man;  and  more  perff^ct  specimens  of  masculine 
vigor  I  have  never  seen.  The  competitors  at  the  Olympic 
games  might  have  envied  such  bones  and  muscles  so  perfectly 
developed.  The  Pangwe  people  are  just  emerging  from  the 
unknown  wilds  of  Central  Africa,  and  are  still  free  from  many 
of  the  effects,  both  good  and  bad,  of  intercourse  with  civihzed 
men.  No  white  man  had  ever  before  been  seen  in  their  place; 
and  few,  if  any  of  them,  had  ever  before  beheld  a  white  face. 
They  took  it  for  granted  that  I  came  as  their  friend,  and  brought 
me  presents  of  spears  and  such  other  implements  as  they  pos- 


As  a  result  of  these  tours  it  was  found  that  there  was  a 
remarkable  unity  of  language  among  the  races  of  Central 
Africa,  so  that  the  early  hope  was  reenforced  that  this 
mission  on  the  west  coast  might  be  the  point  of  approach  to 


132  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

the  vast  interior  of  the  continent.  In  this  good  hope  the 
missionaries  were  content  to  labor  and  to  wait.  The  words 
they  sent  back  at  the  close  of  this  period  of  the  mission's  his- 
tory not  only  reflect  the  situation,  but  show  the  quality  of  the 
missionaries:  ''Before  a  mission  can  be  established  in  the 
interior,  the  acquaintance  of  the  intermediate  people  must 
be  made,  their  confidence  gained,  and  their  language  learned. 
We  must  estabhsh  a  line  of  communication,  and  be  able  to 
preserve  it,  or  it  will  be  madness  to  attempt  the  conquest  of 
those  wild  and  barbarous  regions.  This  line  of  communica- 
tion must  be  in  the  hearts  of  the  people.  We  are  ready  to 
attempt  this  to  the  extent  of  our  abihty,  and  beyond  our 
ability.  The  providence  of  God  beckons  us  onward;  and 
trusting  in  the  great  Captain  of  our  salvation,  we  hope  to 
gain  the  victory." 

Almost  at  the  same  time  that  the  Board  was  landing  its 
first  missionaries  on  the  west  coast  of  Africa,  it  was  preparing 
Zulu  Mis-  to  begin  operations  among  the  Zulus  on  the  eastern 
sionBegun,  side  of  the  continent.  In  the  choice  of  this  loca- 
^^35  tion  the  Board  was  guided  by  Dr.  Philip,  superin- 

tendent of  the  London  Missionary  Society's  work  in  South 
Africa,  who  pointed  out  that  the  Zulus  were  the  leading  race 
in  that  region.  A  branch  of  the  Bantus,  they  were  distinct 
from  the  Hottentots,  their  appearance  and  characteristics 
marking  them  as  of  a  higher  order.  The  prowess  of  their 
great  chieftain,  Chaka,  had  made  them  lords  of  the  land  north- 
ward to  the  Limpopo. 

The  event  has  abundantly  justified  the  Board's  choice  of 
this  people,  since  it  has  appeared  that  their  language  is  the 
lingua  franca  of  the  land,  in  one  or  another  dialect  being  under- 
stood also  among  the  Barotse  and  the  Matabele,  through  the 
Transvaal,  and  even  in  Gazaland.  And  the  race  is  as  widely 
diffused  as  its  speech;  it  is  found  everywhere  through  south- 
eastern Africa. 

Though  stalwart  and  aggressive  as  a  race,  the  Zulus  were 


ATTEMPTING   AFRICA  133 

savages  and  heathen  when  the  missionaries  found  them.  They 
Uved  in  kraals,  or  villages,  consisting  of  a  circle  of  huts 
Character-  looking  like  huge  beehives,  a  single  hole  in  the 
istics  of  the  side  of  each  answering  for  door,  window,  and 
Zulus  chimney.     Around  the  one  room  the  occupants  of  the 

hut  squatted  or  stretched  themselves  for  sleep.  They  wore  little 
clothing,  but  a  profuse  amount  of  beads  and  other  barbarous 
ornaments.  The  men  were  warriors,  hunters,  and  herdsmen; 
the  women  did  the  menial  work  in  the  fields  or  in  the  kraals. 
They  were  a  polygamous  people,  a  man's  wealth  consisting 
largely  in  the  number  of  his  wives,  who  wore  virtually  his 
slaves.  The  other  item  of  wealth  was  cattle,  either  being 
negotiable  in  terms  of  the  other;  the  usual  quotation  was  ten 
to  twenty  cows  for  a  wife.  Daughters  were  prized  because 
of  their  monetary  value  in  cattle.  The  religion  of  the  Zulu, 
if  such  it  could  be  called,  was  a  gross  superstition,  including 
belief  in  witches,  dependence  upon  witch  doctors  and  rain 
doctors,  and  the  worship  of  ancestral  spirits. 

The  missionaries  at  first  thought  the  Zulus  a  moral  people 
for  one  so  uncivilized,  but  on  closer  acquaintance  declared  that 
they  broke  every  commandment,  being  especially  destructive 
of  the  seventh  and  ninth,  and  much  given  to  strong  drink. 
With  no  development  in  the  arts  or  industries  of  even  half- 
civilized  life,  ignorant,  superstitious,  warlike,  they  were  an 
essentially  lawless  people,  living  easily  when  they  could,  fight- 
ing hard  when  their  passions  were  roused,  gorging  themselves 
when  food  was  plenty,  making  little  provision  for  the  future, 
content  to  live  in  squalor  and  vice. 

Shortly  before  the  arrival  of  the  missionaries  a  war  for 
supremacy  between  Dingaan,  a  brother  of  the  mighty  Chaka, 
The  Plan  and  one  of  the  late  king's  generals,  had  split  the 
of  the  nation  in  two,  and  the  defeated  chief  had  retreated 

Mission  ^q  h^q  interior  with  his  portion  of  the  tribe.  So 
there  were  now  two  kingdoms,  with  a  mountain  between  their 
territories  and  a  mountain  of  fear  and  hate  between  their 


134  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

peoples.  The  missionaries,  therefore,  deemed  it  necessary  to 
divide  their  forces,  one  part  to  estabhsh  itself,  if  it  might,  in 
Dingaan's  kingdom,  and  the  other  in  the  kingdom  of  the 
defeated  Umzilikazi  (Moselekatse). 

Upon  arrival  in  Cape  Town,  one  company,  consisting  of  the 
Venables,  Lindleys,  and  Wilsons,  set  forth  in  three  large  wagons 
upon  their  long  trek  to  Umzilikazi's  country,  1000  miles  to  the 
northward  and  500  miles  west  from  Natal.  The  other  group, 
consisting  of  Aldin  Grout,  Newton  Adams,  M.D.,  and  George 
Champion,  with  their  wives,  who  were  to  start  the  maritime 
mission,  were  prevented  from  going  at  once  to  their  field  as 
their  route  lay  through  a  part  of  the  country  where  the  Kaffirs 
and  Dutch  Boers  were  fighting.  The  delay  gave  them  time 
to  study  the  Zulu  language  and  to  win  the  good  opinion  of 
foreign  residents  in  Cape  Town,  from  whom  they  were  after- 
ward to  receive  substantial  aid. 

At  length  the  men  of  the  party  succeeded  in  reaching  Din- 
gaan's kraal,  about  160  miles  from  Port  Natal,  and  were  encour- 
aged by  the  kindly  welcome  of  the  natives,  the  beauty  and 
fertility  of  the  land,  and  the  quahfied  consent  of  the  chief,  to 
open  a  mission. 

While  the  other  two  returned  to  Cape  Town  to  bring  the 
ladies  of  the  party  and  the  mission  goods,  Mr.  Champion  set 
himself  to  build  the  mission  houses,  and  actually  began  mission 
work  by  opening  a  school  under  the  shade  of  a  tree,  where, 
using  the  sand  for  a  blackboard,  he  welcomed  those  of  all 
ages  and  conditions  who  were  ready  to  become  his  scholars. 

The  coast  party  had  hardly  reached  Umlazi,  the  first  loca- 
tion for  their  mission,  when  they  were  surprised  by  the  arrival 
of  the  members  of  the  mission  to  the  interior,  who  had  found 
it  impossible  to  locate  in  Umzilikazi's  territory,  it  was  so  full 
of  savagery  and  fighting.  They  had,  therefore,  taken  to  the 
wagons  again  for  the  still  longer  roundabout  journey  across 
the  Drackenberg  Mountains  to  join  their  brethren. 

With  so  enlarged  a  force  and  with  room  enough  for  all,  in  a 


ATTEMPTING  AFRICA  135 

few  months  four  stations  were  occupied  and  two  schools  under 
way;  the  printing  press  was  in  operation  and  regular  preaching 
services  arranged,  which  drew  large  congregations.  But  when 
war  broke  out  between  Dingaan  and  the  Boers,  the  country 
became  again  a  battle-field  and  the  missionaries  were  obliged 
to  retreat. 

So  serious  and  prolonged  was  the  interruption  of  this  war 
that  inquiries  began  to  be  made  as  to  a  more  fortunate  point 
The  o^  approach  to  the  eastern  side  of  the  continent. 

Second  Zanzibar  was  considered  as  a  possible  location,  and 
Step  had  been  approved  by  the  Board,  when  at  last  the 

overthrow  of  Dingaan  and  the  succession  of  a  chief  of  different 
temper  brightened  the  outlook  for  work  among  the  Zulus. 
By  this  time  the  mission  had  become  almost  disorganized. 
Messrs.  Grout  and  Champion  were  in  the  United  States;  Mr. 
Lindley  had  reluctantly  turned  aside  to  work  for  the  Dutch 
emigrants,  in  whose  welfare  he  had  become  interested.  At 
length  a  new  start  was  made  at  Umlazi,  where  Dr.  and  Mrs. 
Adams  were  already  located,  and  where  the  usual  departments 
of  station  work  were  at  once  developed. 

But  Mr.  Grout  was  eagerly  watching  for  a  chance  to  reenter 
the  real  Zulu  country,  and  upon  invitation  from  Umpandi,  the 
new  chief,  a  station  was  opened  at  Impanyezi,  just  four  years 
after  the  missionaries  had  been  obliged  to  retire. 

This  new  location  was  the  center  of  a  district  with  thirty- 
seven  villages,  where  the  Grouts  found  ''nothing  to  fear  except 
wild  beasts."  Their  first  dwelling  was  a  mere  native  hut, 
but  lines  of  mission  work  were  soon  taken  up,  and  with  such 
interest  on  the  part  of  the  natives  as  to  prompt  high  hopes. 
Suddenly  the  chief,  jealous  of  the  missionaries'  success  and 
prestige,  began  a  ferocious  slaughter  of  his  people,  exterminat- 
ing some  villages  as  a  warning  to  the  rest.  No  violence  was 
attempted  upon  the  missionaries,  but  under  such  conditions 
it  was  impossible  to  maintain  the  mission  and  its  members 
were   again   compelled  to  fall   back.     Afterward   trouble  also 


136  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

broke  out  between  the  British  forces  and  Dutch  settlers,  mak- 
ing even  Natal  unsuitable  for  residence.  The  entire  region 
seemed  impossible  for  missionary  work;  the  Board  therefore 
decided  in  1843  to  discontinue  the  mission  and  sent  out  instruc- 
tions to  that  effect. 

Before  these  instructions  could  be  carried  out,  another 
change  reversed  the  situation.  The  British  got  control  of 
Natal  and  established  a  better  order  of  things.  A 
^  ^  new  commissioner  arrived,  fair  toward  native  inter- 
ests and  friendly  to  the  missionaries.  Justice  was 
now  to  be  even-handed,  without  distinction  of  color  and  with 
laws  protecting  the  rights  of  all.  The  commissioner  was  dis- 
posed to  rely  upon  the  mission  stations  and  missionaries  to 
assist  in  developing  the  native  life.  Here  was  a  new  face 
upon  affairs.  The  prestige  of  the  missionaries  was  at  once 
raised.  Multitudes  of  natives  flocked  into  Natal  for  the  pro- 
tection of  its  juster  laws.  Moreover,  chief  Umpandi  now 
showed  a  different  temper,  requesting  that  a  colonial  agent 
and  a  missionary  might  be  assigned  to  reside  near  him. 

With  some  doubt  as  to  the  wisdom  of  such  alliance  between 
political  and  missionary  interests,  the  Board  felt  encouraged 
to  make  another  trial  of  its  enterprise.  To  this  decision  they 
were  urged  by  the  Christian  settlers  of  the  region  who  sent 
an  appeal  to  the  Board  not  to  abandon  the  mission,  and  at 
a  public  meeting  in  Cape  Town,  under  the  lead  of  Dr.  Philip 
and  the  American  consul,  raised  $800  to  defray  Mr.  Grout's 
expenses  until  word  could  come  from  the  Board  reversing  its 
action. 

New  locations  were  now  made,  the  first  at  Umvote,  some 
forty  miles  north  from  Durban  and  about  twenty  miles  from 
Settling  Umpandi's  kingdom.  Reenforcements  began  to 
Down  to  arrive;  three  stations  were  soon  in  operation,  includ- 
Work  ing  Inanda,   to  which  Daniel  Lindley  removed  in 

1847,  returning  thus  to  the  distinctively  foreign  missionary 
work  for  which  he  had  come  to  Africa.     The  opening  of  these 


ATTEMPTING  AFRICA  137 

pioneer  stations  was  primitive  toil.  At  first  the  missionary's 
wagon,  with  its  ''span/'  or  six  pairs  of  oxen,  was  not  only  his 
carriage,  but  his  house  as  well,  until  he  could  get  one  built. 
And  that  first  house,  made  largely  with  his  own  hands  and 
sufficing  for  several  years,  cost  about  $75.  The  work  of  the 
mission  was  equally  primitive  and  simple.  It  was  evident 
at  once  that  it  was  to  be  a  long  and  hard  task  to  overcome 
this  unmitigated  heathen  life. 

Yet  by  patience,  steadfastness,  and  genuine  love  for  the 
people,  the  missionaries  slowly  won  their  way.  Reviewing  his 
Winning  early  labors  Aldin  Grout'  once  said:  ''I  worked  there 
their  as  God  gave  me  opportunity  for  ten  years  with 

Way  various  interruptions,  and  at  the  end  of  that  time 

I  could  not  point  to  a  single  convert  or  to  a  single  one  of  my 
hearers  of  whom  I  could  confidently  say  that  he  had  been 
benefited  by  my  message."  Then  he  added,  "It  never  entered 
my  head  to  doubt  that  I  and  my  fellow  laborers  were  where 
God  called  us  to  labor." 

And  in  time  results  did  appear.  In  1846  a  Zulu  woman  was 
admitted  to  the  church  at  Umlazi;  four  others  were  propounded 
at  the  close  of  the  same  year.  A  rehgious  quickening  was 
apparent  in  all  the  stations.  By  the  subtle  tests  of  spiritual 
feeling  the  missionaries  recognized  a  change  for  the  better. 
An  account  of  a  communion  service  held  by  this  mission  at 
the  very  hour  when  the  Board,  at  its  annual  meeting  in  Brook- 
lyn in  1845,  was  also  celebrating  the  Lord's  Supper,  reveals 
the  temper  of  the  missionaries.  They  contrasted  the  spacious 
church  in  the  homeland,  with  its  elect  fellowship,  and  the  room 
in  which  they  sat,  surrounded  by  a  Httle  company  of  people 
scarcely  out  of  heathenism.  Outside  was  the  dark  land  where 
Chaka  had  left  his  bones,  and  where  the  bleached  bones  of 
some  of  his  people  were  yet  lying  in  sight,  but  a  short  distance 
from  the  door.  Surrounded  by  these  dry  bones,  dead  and 
alive,  hearing  the  command  of  the  Master,  ''Do  this  in  remem- 
brance of  me,"  the  answer  of  the  missionaries  was,  "Yes,  dear 


138  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

Saviour,  we  will  remember  thee,  not  only  in  thine  ordinances, 
but  we  will  preach,  we  will  prophesy  upon  these  bones,  and 
say  to  them,  '0  ye  dry  bones,  hear  the  word  of  the  Lord,'  and 
by  thy  grace  may  we  soon  see  'bone  coming  to  his  bone,' 
and  spiritual  life  breathed  into  them." 

The  arrival  of  fresh  recruits  in  1849,  including  such  familiar 
names  as  those  of  the  Lewis  Grouts,  the  Irelands,  the  Wilders, 
More  ^nd  Tylers,  made  it  possible  to  multiply  and  broaden 

Rapid  the  lines  of  work.     Day  and  evening  schools,  as  well 

Growth  as  boarding-schools,  were  now  maintained  in  all  the 
stations  with  the  help  of  native  teachers.  There  was  no 
difficulty  in  getting  congregations;  from  600  to  800  would 
flock  to  the  services.  The  monthly  missionary  prayer  meet- 
ing was  judged  to  be  the  most  spirited  exercise  of  all,  the 
native  Christians  bringing  to  it  their  contributions  not  only 
of  word  and  prayer,  but  of  money  as  well.  Soon  they  had 
raised  the  sum,  large  for  them,  of  $15,  given  to  support  one 
of  their  own  number  who  might  go  forth  to  labor  for  those 
yet  sitting  in  darkness. 

By  1850  the  mission  could  report  twelve  stations  and  six 
outstations,  twenty-six  missionaries,  counting  both  men  and 
The  Out-  women,  and  six  native  helpers.  Six  churches  had 
look  in  by  this  time  been  formed,  of  whose  seventy-eight 
1850  members  more  than  half  had  been  admitted  during 

the  preceding  year.  A  half-miUion  pages  had  been  printed 
in  the  Zulu  tongue,  and  scattered  through  the  land,  and  a 
monthly  paper  had  been  started.  The  preparatory  work, 
such  as  clearing  ground  and  erecting  buildings,  which  had 
imposed  so  heavy  a  task  upon  the  missionaries'  time  and 
strength  at  first,  was  now  accomplished,  and  more  attention 
could  be  given  to  developing  the  actual  work  of  the  mission. 

The  chief  obstacle  to  the  progress  of  the  people  was  their 
moral  degradation,  of  which  the  missionaries  became  increas- 
ingly aware.  Their  coarse  vices,  dragging  them  lower  than 
the  brutes,  tended  to  make  them  indifferent  if  not  opposed 


ATTEMPTING   AFRICA  139 

to  a  religion  which  summoned  them  to  cleanness  of  heart  and 
righteousness  of  conduct.  When  they  found  that  the  gospel 
was  opposed  to  polygamy,  parents  were  loath  to  put  their 
children  under  the  influence  of  the  missionaries,  lest  they 
should  become  converted. 

Yet  Christian  marriages  were  increasing,  twelve  being 
reported  in  one  year.  The  visible  effects  of  the  missionaries' 
work  were  further  to  be  seen  in  better  homes  and  apparel, 
in  improved  behavior  during  public  worship,  and  in  a  grow- 
ing desire  for  fairer  conditions  of  life.  The  native  helpers, 
both  as  teachers  and  preachers,  though  not  all  that  could  be 
desired  in  piety,  scholarship,  or  maturity  of  character,  yet 
showed  genuine  fruits  of  Christian  experience  and  training, 
and  stood  relatively  to  their  people,  it  was  believed,  as  well 
as  the  ministers  in  New  England  towns.  As  the  period  closes, 
stress  was  being  put  upon  the  need  of  increasing  the  efficiency 
of  these  native  agencies,  and  it  was  planned  to  open  a  seminary 
to  prepare  native  preachers. 

The  founders  of  the  mission,  comparing  the  early  days  when 
they  ''wandered  in  the  wilderness  in  a  solitary  way  and  found 
no  place  to  dwell  in,"  and  when  the  Board  was  on  the  point 
of  abandoning  what  seemed  to  be  a  futile  mission,  with  this 
time,  when  to  every  eye  it  was  apparent  that  the  mission  was 
firmly  planted  and  bearing  an  increasing  harvest,  gave  glory 
to  God  for  the  manifestations  of  His  signal  favor. 


Chapter  VIII 

THE  PERIOD  OF  ADOLESCENCE 

A  SMALL  and  feeble  plant  was  this  American  Board  in  1810, 
and  set  in  uncongenial  soil  and  at  an  unpromising  time.  The 
The  Day  General  Association  of  Massachusetts  had  created 
of  Small  it,  but  with  no  general  enthusiasm  or  approval.  It 
Things  never  would  have  been  organized  then  but  for  the 
importunity  of  the  young  men  waiting  to  be  sent  forth.  The 
missionaries  preceded  the  missionary  board  and  compelled  it. 

And  the  organization  at  first  was  slight  and  incomplete. 
When  the  commissioners  appointed  at  Bradford  held  their 
first  meeting  at  Farmington,  Connecticut,  September  5,  1810, 
but  five  members  were  present.  The  only  other  attendant 
was  Governor  Treadwell's  pastor,  Rev.  Noah  Porter,  in  whose 
house  they  met.  The  next  five  annual  meetings  were  also 
held  in  private  parlors,  the  chambers  of  the  house  usually 
sufficing  to  lodge  the  party.  After  that,  for  several  years  a 
church  vestry  provided  room  enough  for  the  meeting;  in  1823 
it  was  held  in  the  Court  House,  Boston;  in  1825  in  the  Town 
Hall,  Northampton. 

The  transacting  of  the  Board's  business  in  those  days  was 
also  a  modest  and  simple  undertaking.  At  the  outset  it  was 
done  in  a  single  small  room  in  the  basement  of  Jeremiah  Evarts' 
home,  on  Pinckney  Street,  Boston,  Mr.  Evarts  serving  first 
as  editor,  from  the  second  year  as  treasurer,  and  always  as 
a  valued  helper  to  the  corresponding  secretary.  At  the  begin- 
ning the  Prudential  Committee  consisted  of  three  members, 
and  their  meetings  were  held,  as  need  was,  from  two  to  four 
times  a  year,   and  as  convenience  served,  at  Newburyport, 

140 


THE  PERIOD  OF  ADOLESCENCE  141 

Salem,  Charlestown,  Boston,  Andover,  Worcester,  or  Hartford. 
By  1819  Boston  was  the  usual  place  of  meeting;  by  1822  a 
suite  of  rooms  had  been  secured  on  Cornhill  for  the  use  of 
the  officers  and  for  the  Committee's  sessions;  by  1832  weekly 
meetings  of  the  Committee  were  the  order. 

When  the  first  missionaries  sailed  the  Board  had  no  legal 
existence,  and  the  prospect  of  getting  a  charter  was  far  from 
bright.  The  leaders  of  the  Massachusetts  Legislature  were 
political  foes  of  the  main  supporters  of  the  Board,  and  it  was 
not  till  after  a  conflict  lasting  through  two  sessions  that  the 
act  of  incorporation  was  secured  in  June,  1812.  In  the  course 
of  the  heated  discussion  over  the  granting  of  this  charter  the 
historic  objection  was  made  that  it  was  designed  to  afford 
means  of  exporting  religion,  whereas  the  country  had  none  to 
spare,  to  which  Judge  White,  of  Newburyport,  made  reply, 
as  profound  as  clever,  that  "religion  was  a  commodity  of 
which  the  more  we  exported  the  more  we  had  remaining." 

Neither  at  home  nor  abroad  did  the  time  seem  ripe  for  this 
venture.  The  world  was  still  remote,  a  closed  and  unfriendly 
world.  Travel  was  slow  and  difficult.  There  were  no  rail- 
ways; a  few  steamboats  were  experimenting  in  quiet  waters 
amid  much  ridicule.  The  East  was  largely  unexplored;  the 
southern  continents  all  but  unknown.  It  was  not  certain 
that  missionaries  would  be  tolerated  in  any  of  these  strange 
lands;  the  record  of  those  who  had  tried  to  find  an  opening 
was  not  encouraging. 

The  homeland  was  yet  scarcely  sure  of  its  own  life;  facing 
another  costly  war  with  England;  weak  on  the  ocean;  with 
its  resources  undeveloped  and  its  future  a  dizzy  uncertainty. 
Moreover,  there  was  no  sure  support  for  the  Board.  Only 
individuals  here  and  there  could  be  depended  upon  as  having 
even  a  quahfied  confidence  in  its  proposals. 

In  such  a  situation,  denied  legal  standing  and  hearty  church 
support,  in  spite  of  scornful  objections,  with  little  organization 
and  no  accumulated  funds,  without  a  single  door  of   oppor- 


142  STORY  OF.  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

tunity  opening  before  it,  but  inspired  by  the  devotion  of  its 
first  appointees,  clutching  at  such  tidings  of  success  as  came  to 
it  from  Enghsh  brethren  working  among  the  Hottentots  and 
the  South  Sea  Islanders,  and  sustained  by  the  mighty  faith 
of  its  founders,  the  American  Board  went  at  its  task. 

In  such  circumstances  it  was  necessary  that  procedure  should 

be  cautious;  that  much  should  be  left  for  decision  upon  fuller 

knowledge  and  experience.     The  main  purpose  was 

Feeling  its   ^^^^^    ^^^^^    ^^    doubtful.     ''The    object    of    this 

Board,"  it  was  declared,  "is  to  devise,  adopt,  and 
prosecute  ways  and  means  for  propagating  the  gospel  among 
those  who  are  destitute  of  knowledge  of  Christianity."  Wisely 
the  first  instructions  to  those  going  to  the  field  were  of  general 
character  and  put  on  them  large  responsibihty.  They  were 
to  cultivate  their  personal  life;  to  have  charity  among  them- 
selves; to  regard  all  missionaries  of  other  denominations  as 
brethren;  to  abstain  from  interference  with  political  affairs; 
as  far  as  possible  to  live  peaceably  with  all  men;  to  decide  on 
arrival  where  to  locate;  to  organize  their  mission  decently  and 
in  order;  to  form  a  church  and  observe  the  Sabbath,  first 
agreeing  as  to  when  the  Sabbath  should  begin;  to  learn  the 
language  and  approach  the  Gentiles  graciously;  to  admit  to 
the  church  only  believers;  to  strike  for  the  youth;  to  do  their 
best  to  secure  their  own  support. 

The  organizing  and  developing  of  the  home  base  show  the 
same  spirit  of  caution.  The  number  of  commissioners,  origi- 
nally nine,  five  of  them  residents  of  Massachusetts  and  four  of 
Connecticut,  was  quickly  increased;  thirteen  were  added  in 
1812,  most  of  them  being  Congregationahsts.  Apparently  at 
the  outset  there  was  no  thought  that  the  Board  was  to  be 
other  than  a  Congregational  society,  though  in  name,  charter, 
purpose,  and  policy  it  was  amply  conceived  to  include  other 
bodies  of  Christians,  as  it  soon  came  to  do.  In  1819  corre- 
sponding members  were  added  from  distinguished  friends  of 
missions  in  America  and  Europe,   and  in   1821   the  class  of 


THE  PERIOD  OF  ADOLESCENCE  143 

honorary  members  was  instituted,  composed  of  those  in  whose 
name  considerable  gifts  were  made  to  the  Board,  and  to  whom 
were  open  all  the  rights  of  corporate  members  save  the  power 
of  voting.  The  actual  administration  of  the  Board's  affairs 
was  entrusted  to  the  customary  officers,  certain  corresponding 
secretaries,  and  a  prudential  committee  whose  votes,  as  attested 
by  the  signatures  of  its  officers  and  by  the  corporation  seal, 
constituted  the  legal  basis  of  its  operations. 

It  was  wonderful  how  quickly  recruits  came  in  those  early 
days,  not  in  the  light  spirit  of  adventure  or  romance,  but  under 
The  Mis-  the  sobering  sense  of  a  tremendous  responsibility, 
sionary  Then  as  now  the  missionary  motive  was  complex. 
Motive  The  Board's  first  addresses  to  the  Christian  public 
sound  many  notes  of  appeal:  Christ's  last  command;  his  claim 
to  the  uttermost  parts  of  the  earth;  the  cruelty  and  misery 
of  heathendom;  the  vision  of  a  renovated  world.  But  the 
supreme  incentive  to  missionary  devotion  then  was  an  aroused 
sense  of  vast  multitudes  of  souls  dead  in  trespasses  and  sins. 
The  call  that  counted  was  the  summons  to  rescue  the  perishing; 
the  obligation  that  enforced  the  call  was  a  knowledge  of  Christ. 

A  challenge  to  missionary  service,  typical  of  the  times  and 
signed  by  Hall  and  Newell,  clinched  its  argument  with  a  por- 
trayal of  the  final  judgment  and  the  awful  condemnation  then 
to  be  brought  home  to  careless  disciples  of  Christ  in  beholding 
a  stream  of  unsaved  heathen  borne  on  to  eternal  doom.  It 
was  to  seek  and  to  save  the  lost  that  the  early  missionaries 
left  home  and  native  land,  to  fulfil  their  obligation  as  redeemed 
men  and  women  in  making  known  their  Saviour  to  those  who 
had  not  yet  heard  of  him.  Under  this  constraint  they  were 
ready  to  dare  any  danger  and  to  undertake  any  labor. 

Judson's  letter  asking  for  the  hand  of  Ann  Haseltine  shows 
the  anticipations  with  which  the  first  missionaries  set  forth: 
**I  have  now  to  ask,"  he  wrote  her  father,  '' whether  you  can 
consent  to  part  with  your  daughter  early  next  spring,  to  see 
her  no  more  in  this  world?  whether  you  can  consent  to  her 


144  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

departure  to  a  heathen  land,  and  her  subjection  to  the  hard- 
ships and  sufferings  of  a  missionary  hfe?  whether  you  can 
consent  to  her  exposure  to  the  dangers  of  the  ocean;  to  the 
fatal  influence  of  the  southern  climate  of  India;  to  every  kind 
of  want  and  distress;  to  degradation,  insults,  persecution,  and 
perhaps  a  violent  death  ?  Can  you  consent  to  all  this  for  the 
sake  of  Him  who  left  His  heavenly  home  and  died  for  her  and 
for  you;  for  the  sake  of  perishing  immortal  souls;  for  the  sake 
of  Zion  and  the  glory  of  God?" 

The  appalling  list  of  deaths  and  enforced  withdrawals, 
which,  largely  through  ignorance  and  inexperience,  marked 
the  foreign  missionary  work  in  this  period,  did  not  cause  the 
stream  of  volunteers  to  slacken.  The  thinning  of  the  ranks 
stimulated  the  missionary  purpose  of  many  Uves.  During  the 
first  quarter  of  a  century  the  growth  in  number  of  missionaries 
was  more  marked  than  in  receipts;  in  its  closing  year  forty- 
seven  missionaries  and  assistants  were  sent  out  and  thirty- 
three  others  were  under  appointment. 

Among  the  plans  which,  in  those  experimental  days,  the 
Board  devised  for  equipping  its  mission  fields  with  workers, 
The  was   one   to   train   promising   youths   who   should 

Cornwall  come  to  America  from  various  parts  of  the  pagan 
School  world  that  they  might  go  back  to  evangelize  their 

own  people.  The  discovery  of  Obookiah  and  his  Sandwich 
Islands  mates  and  their  stirring  plea  for  an  education  gave 
impetus  to  this  plan.  In  1817  a  school  was  established  at 
Cornwall,  Connecticut,  with  Rev.  Herman  Daggett  as  prin- 
cipal. The  first  year  there  were  twelve  students,  including 
five  from  the  Sandwich  Islands,  two  from  India,  and  one  North 
American  Indian.  The  expenses  of  the  school  were  necessarily 
large,  but  it  was  maintained  generously  by  popular  favor. 
The  second  year  there  were  twenty  scholars,  with  seven  nation- 
alities represented;  the  tone  of  the  school  was  fine;  the  young 
men  lived  together  happily;  their  discipline  and  studiousness 
were  satisfactory.     The  following  year  the  number  had  grown 


THE  PERIOD   OF  ADOLESCENCE  145 

to  thirty-two  and  the  outlook  was  still  encouraging.  But  by 
1823  the  enthusiasm  had  begun  to  lag,  and  serious  difficulties 
appeared  in  managing  a  company  so  mixed  as  to  race,  so  unlike 
in  training  and  capacity.  The  reports  from  some  of  those 
who  had  been  trained  in  the  school  and  sent  back  to  their 
native  lands  raised  doubts  as  to  the  wisdom  of  this  method 
of  preparing  a  native  agency.     In  1827  the  school  was  closed. 

But  how  should  funds  be  secured  to  maintain  the  growing 
enterprise?  The  Prudential  Committee,  studying  ways  and 
Agencies  means,  could  think  of  no  better  plan  than  to  organ- 
and  ize,   in  the  principal  towns  of  New  England  and 

Auxiliaries  beyond,  societies  auxiliary  to  the  Board,  whose 
special  business  it  should  be  to  gather  funds.  Neither  churches 
nor  pastors  were  then  so  generally  committed  to  the  enterprise 
that  reUance  could  be  put  on  ecclesiastical  machinery  for 
producing  the  revenue.  Agents  were  therefore  appointed  by 
the  Board  to  form  and  stimulate  these  associations  and  through 
them  to  secure  the  treasury's  constant  supply.  By  1817  the 
Board  had  eight  such  agents. 

These  auxiliary  societies  were  of  various  sorts  and  names, 
but  were  simply  the  organizing  of  men,  women,  and  children, 
usually  with  division  of  the  sexes,  into  some  association  for 
missionary  giving.  No  better  proof  of  the  reality  and  vigor 
of  this  missionary  awakening  can  be  found  than  the  rapidity 
with  which  these  associations  multiplied  and  spread  over  the 
land.  By  1818  there  were  300  of  them,  eighty-one  for  men, 
173  for  women,  and  twenty  for  both  sexes.  By  the  end  of  the 
first  decade  they  numbered  500;  by  1839,  1600;  more  than 
680  women's  organizations  were  then  collecting  funds  for  the 
American  Board.  Local  associations  so  early  as  1823  began 
to  be  united  by  districts  into  ^'auxiharies,"  through  which 
they  were  kept  in  communication  with  the  Board. 

At  first  there  was  much  spontaneity  and  enterprise  in 
these  small  bodies  of  givers;  as  time  went  on,  it  became  more 
difficult  to  keep  up  the  organization.     Other  societies,  seeing 


146  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

the  efficiency  of  the  system,  adopted  it  to  such  an  extent  that 
at  last  it  broke  by  its  own  weight. 

The  pubhshed  acknowledgments  of  receipts  afford  interest- 
ing glimpses  of  the  early  givers  and  their  gifts:  ''From  an  ob- 
scure female,  $100";  ''by  ten  httle  girls,  earned  by  committing 
Scripture  to  memory  and  abstaining  from  sugar,  $1.29";  "saved 
from  the  trimmings  of  wearing  apparel,  $3";  "the  box  in 
the  vestry  of  the  Old  South  Church,  Boston,  $20";  "an  un- 
known person  in  the  district  of  Maine,  $10."  All  sorts  of 
names  were  taken  by  these  groups  of  givers:  Female  Cent 
Societies  were  numerous;  also  Gentlemen's  Societies;  Heathen 
School  Societies;  Juvenile  Societies.  In  the  larger  cities  and 
towns  there  was  usually  a  Foreign  Missionary  Society  of  the 
place  or  district. 

Despite  all  this  organization  and  systematic  canvass  the 
needs  were  not  met.  Other  missionary  societies  had  an  oppo- 
The  site  experience,   but   during  the  first  fifteen  years 

Financial  the  American  Board  always  had  more  suitable  men 
Problem  ready  to  go  to  the  field  than  could  be  sent.  The 
Home  Department  had  the  heavy  end  of  the  load;  it  was  even 
harder  to  find  officers  and  agents  for  it  than  to  secure  mis- 
sionaries. 

At  the  end  of  the  first  decade  the  Board  was  spending  $40,000 
a  year  and  with  a  small  deficit.  During  this  period  it  had 
expended  a  little  over  $200,000;  about  one-haK  of  the  sum  in 
India  and  Ceylon,  one-quarter  on  the  North  American  Indians, 
$10,000  in  the  Sandwich  Islands,  and  $17,000  on  the  Cornwall 
school.  In  1833  there  were  reported  expenditures  of  $150,000 
and  a  balance  in  the  treasury  of  over  $2,000. 

The  year  1837  brought  the  Board  to  its  severest  finan- 
cial test,  and  also  to  its  most  remarkable  deliverance. 
Receipts  had  been  falling  off  during  August  and  September, 
1836,  so  that  at  the  annual  meeting  of  that  year  the  Board 
was  reported  nearly  $40,000  in  debt.  Forty-four  appointed 
missionaries  were  being  held  back.     The  meeting  said,  "Send 


THE  PERIOD  OF  ADOLESCENCE  147 

the  missionaries  by  all  means ;  necessary  funds  will  be  pro- 
vided." So  they  were  sent,  and  for  a  while  money  came  in 
rapidly.  But  in  February  an  extraordinary  financial  panic 
began  to  press;  receipts  fell  below  $10,000  a  month  the  pre- 
ceding year.  Reductions  were  made;  missionaries  withheld; 
letters  of  appeal  were  issued.  Toward  the  end  of  the  year 
the  tide  turned.  At  its  close  the  receipts  footed  up  $75,000 
more  than  ever  before;  the  debt  had  been  held  down  to 
but  $3000  more  than  the  preceding  year.  While  the  situation 
was  still  anxious,  the  relief  was  great.  Yet  it  had  been 
bought  at  heavy  cost.  The  injury  wrought  by  the  retrench- 
ments of  this  year  on  the  mission  fields  has  been  indicated 
in  preceding  chapters.  Moreover  the  detaining  of  appointed 
missionaries  ready  to  go  to  their  fields  discouraged  new  candi- 
dates; years  might  pass  before  the  missionary  spirit  in  colleges 
and  seminaries  would  recover  from  this  check. 

When,  the  following  year,  the  debt  was  but  little  reduced, 
the  strain  of  the  situation  became  more  intense.  At  length, 
in  1841,  the  annual  meeting  at  Philadelphia  was  prolonged  a 
day  that  the  great  question  of  financing  the  missions  might 
be  satisfactorily  settled.  The  climax  to  an  earnest  discussion 
came  when,  after  prayer  and  in  a  stillness  that  was  eloquent 
of  the  deep  feeling,  there  was  put  to  every  corporate  and  hon- 
orary member  present  these  three  questions:  Will  you  raise 
your  subscription  for  the  coming  year  twenty-five  per  cent? 
Will  you  attempt  to  induce  as  many  as  you  feel  you  can  prop- 
erly approach  to  do  the  same  ?  Will  you  report  to  the  meeting 
next  year  what  the  Lord  hath  enabled  you  to  do  in  this  matter  ? 
One  after  another  came  the  replies,  all  of  them  affirmative  in 
spirit,  some  promising  fifty  per  cent  increase,  others  one  hun- 
dred per  cent,  some  even  greater  increase.  A  following  vote, 
urging  pastors  to  rouse  their  people  to  larger  giving,  reflects 
the  fact  that  by  this  time  less  emphasis  was  being  placed  upon 
the  system  of  auxiliaries  and  that  churches  and  Sunday-schools 
were  being  directly  solicited. 


148  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

Before  adjournment  it  was  further  voted  to  hold  a  special 
meeting  in  the  city  of  New  York  on  January  18,  1842,  to  learn 
the  result  of  these  measures  and  to  consider  what  more  might 
need  to  be  done.  But  when  the  day  arrived  the  Committee 
were  able  to  report  so  large  an  increase  in  receipts  that  the 
meeting  was  turned  into  an  hour  of  thanksgiving  and  praise. 
At  the  close  of  the  year  it  appeared  that  all  expenses  had  been 
met  and  the  dragging  debt  reduced  to  the  nominal  sum  of  $600. 

But  the  problem  of  finance  was  not  solved  with  even  so 
loyal  an  uprising.  Some  reaction  followed;  the  unsteady 
character  of  missionary  giving  kept  the  Board  swinging  between 
hope  and  anxiety.  The  question  of  expenditure  was  carefully 
gone  over.  A  policy  of  concentration  was  avowed,  which 
should  relinquish  all  but  the  more  promising  stations.  When 
by  heavy  relinquishments  a  surplus  was  reported  in  1845  for 
the  first  time  since  1833,  the  next  year  showed  a  falhng  off 
in  receipts;  the  direct  result,  it  was  felt,  of  this  surplus.  During 
the  first  period  of  its  hfe,  though  the  Board  struggled  hard 
over  questions  of  finance,  it  did  not  succeed  in  settling 
them. 

It  was  not  till  the  Board  was  eleven  years  old  that  it  took 
into  its  own  hands  the  issuance  and  control  of  a  magazine. 
The  Mis-  Journals  containing  some  foreign  missionary  intel- 
sionary  ligence  did  indeed  precede  the  Board.  But  neither 
Herald  ^^e  Massachusetts  Missionary  Magazine,  whose  first 
number  appeared  in  1803,  nor  the  Panoplist,  which  started 
in  1805,  gave  much  space  to  what  was  really  missions,  either 
home  or  foreign,  although  a  part  of  the  profits  of  both  publica- 
tions was  devoted  to  missionary  purposes.  After  these  maga- 
^zines  were  combined  in  1808,  under  the  nam^e  of  The  Panoplist 
and  Missionary  Magazine,  increasingly  more  attention  was 
given  to  missionary  news,  and  in  particular  to  the  work  of 
the  American  Board.  In  1818  the  name  of  the  magazine  was 
changed  to  The  Panoplist  and  Missionary  Herald,  and  it  became 
the  medium  for  the  Board's  publication  of  its  news.     Three 


THE  PERIOD  OF  ADOLESCENCE  149 

years  later  it  was  taken  over  and  became  the  property  and 
responsible  organ  of  the  Board,  under  its  present  name. 

In  1822  the  net  profits  of  the  magazine,  after  paying  all  costs 
of  publication,  the  editor's  modest  salary  of  $1000,  and  the 
charge  for  free  copies,  amounted  to  over  $1200.  For  many 
years  the  annual  reports  acknowledged  the  profits  of  the 
Missionary  Herald,  which  were  variously  applied.  Inasmuch 
as  the  magazine  consisted  at  first  of  but  thirty-two  pages, 
without  illustrations,  and  sold  for  $1.50  to  a  community  that 
had  few  publications,  and  no  other  that  traversed  its  field, 
this  financial  success  is  not  so  surprising.  Even  when  some- 
what enlarged  and  embellished,  in  1833,  it  was  capable  of 
more  than  earning  its  way,  attaining  a  circulation  of  over 
20,000  copies.  To  this,  its  main  dependence  for  circulating 
the  news  of  the  missions,  the  Board  added,  in  1841,  a  smaller 
and  cheaper  monthly  called  The  Day  spring.  In  1849  this 
Day  spring  was  changed  to  a  pamphlet  for  ''juveniles,"  and 
called  the  Youth's  Day  spring,  and  was  so  continued  for  six 
years;  another  magazine  about  twice  as  large,  called  The  Journal 
of  Missions,  was  begun  for  adults  in  1850. 

The  first  public  session  of  the  American  Board  was  in  con- 
nection with  the  annual  meeting  in  Middletown,  Connecticut, 
in  1826,  when  a  service  was  held  in  the  Congrega- 
Meetines  ^^^^^^  Church,  with  an  address  by  a  missionary 
from  the  Sandwich  Islands.  The  first  business 
meeting  in  a  church  edifice  was  in  1833;  not  till  1842  was  there 
any  large  attendance.  But  by  1858  the  Board's  annual  meet- 
ings had  become  significant,  with  such  attendance  and  interest 
as  marked  it  as  a  national  society,  the  agent  of  a  mul- 
titude of  churches  and  of  several  great  denominations  of 
Christians. 

It  is  to  be  recognized  that  in  the  earlier  years  the  meetings, 
annual  and  other,  of  the  host  of  auxiliaries,  local,  state,  and 
district,  kept  the  missionary  fires  burning.  In  another  way 
a  widened  and  deeper  hold  on  Christian  hearts  was  won  for 


150  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

the  cause  of  foreign  missions  by  the  setting  apart  of  the  first 
Monday  in  January  as  a  Day  of  Prayer  for  the  world.  The 
appeal  for  this  Day  of  Prayer  was  first  issued  by  the  Board 
for  1845;  a  Week  of  Prayer  at  New  Year's  ''that  all  flesh  might 
see  the  salvation  of  God"  was  later  to  be  asked  for  from  the 
mission  field,  and  was  first  observed  in  1854. 

The  creation  of  this  first  foreign  mission  board  in  America 
impressed  the  whole  Christian  world.  In  Switzerland,  central 
A  Stimu-  Germany,  and  some  parts  of  France,  as  well  as  in 
lus  to  the  mother  country,   the  report  of  its  operations 

Others  proved  a  fresh  stimulus  to  missionary  zeal.  At 
home  the  example  was  even  more  directly  influential.  When 
Luther  Rice,  on  arriving  at  Calcutta,  withdrew  from  the 
Board,  he  returned  to  America  to  promote  the  forming  of  the 
Baptist  Missionary  Union  in  1814.  In  1819  the  Methodists 
also  organized  a  foreign  missionary  society. 

The  Presbyterians  provided  otherwise.  In  1811  the  Ameri- 
can Board  had  ventured  to  suggest  to  the  General  Assembly  the 
expediency  of  a  Presbyterian  society  similar  to  itseK  and  with 
which  it  might  cooperate.  But  the  Assembly  thought  that 
one  society  was  enough  and  urged  its  body  of  churches  to 
adopt  the  American  Board  as  their  foreign  missionary  agency. 
The  following  year  the  Board  elected  representatives  of  the 
Presbyterian  communion  to  its  corporation  and  to  office, 
and  faced  its  work  with  enlarged  purpose.  In  1826  the  United 
Foreign  Missionary  Society,  in  which  the  Presbyterian  and 
Dutch  Reformed  churches  had  been  cooperating,  was  merged 
with  the  Board,  which  now  affirmed  its  purpose  to  be  what  its 
name  declared  it,  a  truly  national  and  comprehensive  foreign 
missionary  society.  Thereupon  the  names  of  eminent  leaders 
of  the  Reformed  Church  in  America  (Dutch  Reformed)  also 
appeared  in  the  lists  of  the  Board's  members  and  officers. 
Important  district  or  sectional  auxiharies  were  later  drawn  to 
the  Board;  notably  in  1834,  the  Foreign  Missionary  Society  of 
the  Western  Reserve,  and  that  of  the  Valley  of  the  Mississippi; 


THE  PERIOD   OF  ADOLESCENCE  151 

in  the  same  year  other  associations,  hke  the  Central  and  the 
Southern  Boards  of  Foreign  Missions,  were  formed  by  various 
synods  to  cooperate  with  the  Board,  though  not  directly 
auxihary  to  it. 

This  union  of  forces  worked  out  admirably,  and  for  the  most 

part  happily.     But  it  could  not  be  permanently  maintained. 

Theological  and  political  differences  were  somewhat 

,  _.^    ®^     accountable  for  the  dissolving  of  the  partnership; 

but  the  growth   of   the  several   denominations   in 

numbers  and  resources  led  many  to  beheve  that  more  could 

be    accomplished    if    each   should    assume    full    responsibility 

for   its   missionary   service.     One  by    one    these   withdrawals 

came,  always   with    cordial   respect,    affection,  and   good-will 

on  both  sides.     The  sorrow  at  parting  was  real  and  deep; 

the   ties   of    comradeship  had  become   almost  too  strong  to 

break. 

I  The  '^Old  School"  Presbyterians  left  the  Board  in  1837,  the 
1  Central  and  Southern  Boards  in  1839;  in  1846,  because  of 
differences  of  opinion  as  to  the  Board's  attitude  toward  slavery, 
some  members  withdrew  to  aid  in  organizing  the  American 
Missionary  Association.  The  ''New  School"  Presbyterians 
and  the  Dutch  Reformed  churches  remained  with  the  Board 
throughout  this  first  period,  but  withdrew  during  the  next. 
No  less  than  five  great  missionary  boards  thus  sprang  from 
this  parent  society. 

Within  the  fifteen  years  beginning  in   1830,   nine  foreign 

missionary  societies  were  formed  in  the  United  States;  added 

to  those  already  in  existence  on  both  sides  of  the 

omity  in     ^^ig^j^^j^^  Ijigy  made  thirty  missionary  organizations, 

whose  paths  were  sure  to  meet  at  many  points. 

How  should  they  fare  together?     The  record  is  in  the  main 

most  gratifying.     They  met   as   comrades,   fellow  soldiers    of 

one  King,  divisions  of  one  great  army.     The  early  formation 

of  Missionary  Unions,  like  that  at  Bombay  in  1825,  composed 

of  members  of  the  London  Missionary  Society,  Church  Mis- 


152  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

sionary  Society,  Scottish  Missionary  Society,  and  American 
Board,  shows  how  the  missionaries  cooperated. 

The  help  that  the  American  Board  derived  in  its  first  ven- 
tures from  the  counsel  and  kindness  of  the  societies  earlier 
in  operation,  both  through  their  officers  and  missionaries,  was 
beyond  measure.  The  generous  aid  of  Bishop  Turner,  of 
Calcutta,  after  the  fire  in  Ceylon,  in  1831;  the  prompt  support 
of  individual  friends  of  other  communions,  and  of  missionary 
organizations  in  Europe  and  England  in  times  of  special  dis- 
tress, as  in  India  and  Turkey,  brought  joy  beyond  the  financial 
relief.  And  from  the  beginning,  as  through  all  its  history,  the 
American  Board  gratefully  recognized  the  indispensable  aid 
of  the  great  interdenominational  auxiharies,  the  British  and 
American  Bible  Societies  and  Tract  Societies,  whose  busy 
presses  filled  the  hands  of  the  missionaries  with  weapons  for 
their  warfare  against  ignorance  and  falsehood. 

In  the  main,  too,  the  occupation  of  fields  was  respected  and 
the  work  of  each  society  was  left  to  proceed  without  inter- 
ference. Yet  not  always.  Occasionally  the  zeal  of  a  missionary 
pathfinder  would  lead  him  to  trespass,  or  the  tenets  of  some 
church  would  prompt  it  to  disregard  the  rights  of  a  society 
whose  policy  was  disapproved.  The  Roman  CathoHc  Church 
was  then  everywhere  intolerant  of  Protestant  missions;  wher- 
ever it  found  them,  it  fought  them.  The  High  Church  party 
of  the  Church  of  England  also  pushed  its  way  into  some  fields 
of  the  Board  to  discredit  the  work  of  its  missionaries,  though 
generally  with  little  permanent  effect. 

The  Board's  principles  in  the  matter  of  comity  were  early 
formulated  (1838),  and,  so  far  as  appears,  with  but  one  or 
two  slips  through  inadvertence,  were  scrupulously  maintained: 
to  claim  no  more  territory  than  it  could  reasonably  hope  to 
occupy;  the  great  centers  of  life  and  commerce  to  be  regarded 
as  common  ground;  each  society  to  respect  the  territorial 
limits  of  others;  the  society  that  contemplates  entering  into 
any  large  section  already  partially  occupied  to  communicate 
first  with  those  already  on  the  field. 


THE    "ROOMS"    IN    1860   AND    1910 

THE  board's  building  IN  PEMBERTON  SQUARE 

THE    GENERAL   OFFICE    IN   THE    CONGREGATIONAL   HOUSE 


THE  PERIOD   OF  ADOLESCENCE  153 

Quietly  but  steadily  the  Board  kept  growing  during  this 
first  period  of  but  little  more  than  a  generation.  From  the 
Growth  basement  of  Mr.  Evarts'  house  the  ^^ missionary 
During  the  room"  was  moved  in  1822  to  rooms  in  the  second 
Period  stor}^  of  a  tenement  in  Cornhill.     In  1826  a  shift 

(1810-50)  ^g^g  jnade  to  the  basement  of  the  Hanover  Street 
Church,  of  which  Dr.  Lyman  Beecher  was  pastor.  When  in 
1830  this  church  was  burned,  the  Board's  property  was  saved 
and  removed  again  to  offices  in  Cornhill.  In  1838  a  three- 
story  missionary  house  was  built  in  Pemberton  Square  by  the 
investment  of  some  of  the  permanent  funds,  and  the  Board 
had  a  home  of  its  own,  which  it  occupied  for  thirty-five  years. 

The  Board  needed  these  larger  quarters  for  it  was  now  a 
larger  institution.  Instead  of  one  corresponding  secretary  and 
a  treasurer  caring  for  both  home  and  foreign  administration 
and  gathering  gifts  from  a  few  auxiliaries,  principally  located 
in  New  England,  as  was  the  case  in  the  early  years,  there  were 
three  secretaries  of  correspondence  and  a  home  field  divided 
into  thirteen  broad  districts,  covering  the  whole  northern 
part  of  the  country  so  far  as  it  was  settled,  and  with  field  secre- 
taries in  each  district.  Instead  of  the  nine  men  who  consti- 
tuted the  Board  in  1810  there  were  now  178  corporate  mem- 
bers and  between  6000  and  7000  honorary  members.  Instead 
of  the  $1000  receipts  of  that  first  year  was  the  record  of  more 
than  $250,000  received  in  1849-50.  Instead  of  an  annual 
meeting  held  in  a  parlor,  with  five  members  present  and  one 
spectator,  was  the  assembling  in  1850  in  the  small  but  com- 
paratively remote  town  of  Oswego,  N.  Y.,  of  a  company  of 
nearly  300  men  and  women  from  sixteen  states,  who  with  the 
people  of  the  place  crowded  the  churches  for  three  days  to 
hear  the  story  of  one  more  year  of  missionary  history.  Hon. 
Theodore  FreHnghuysen  was  in  the  chair,  fit  successor  in 
the  fine  of  Governor  John  Treadwell;  Rev.  Joseph  Lyman, 
and  John  Cotton  Smith;  Chief  Justice  Thomas  S.  Williams 
was  vice-president;  the  body  as  a  whole,  in  learning,  wealth, 


154  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

character,  and  leadership,  was  representative  of  the  best  life 
of  the  country.  The  American  Board  had  taken  its  place 
among  the  honored  and  commanding  institutions  of  the 
land. 

In  1810  one  state  organization  of  a  single  denomination  had 
ventured  to  create  the  Board,  though  with  grave  doubts  and 
An  Inclu-  even  outspoken  opposition.  In  1850  no  less  than 
sive  Or-  four  denominations  of  Christian  churches  were  mak- 
ganization  i^g  it  their  agent  and  loyally  pleading  its  cause. 
From  the  first  it  interpreted  its  relation  to  the  churches  broadly, 
refusing  to  assume  ecclesiastical  responsibilities  either  at  home 
or  abroad,  and  accounting  itself  only  the  servant  of  the  churches 
that  wrought  through  it  to  carry  forward  their  work  in  accord- 
ance with  the  terms  on  which  they  were  united.  While  not  a 
voluntary  association,  or  a  strictly  representative  or  delegated 
body,  but  a  corporation,  qualified  and  set  to  administer  its 
enterprise  according  to  its  own  best  judgment  and  will,  it  yet 
determined  from  the  first  to  avoid  becoming  an  ecclesiastical 
court  or  the  tool  of  a  party  or  sect;  its  sole  business  was  to 
carry  the  gospel,  as  commonly  held  by  the  churches  supporting 
it,  to  the  unevangelized  world;  and  to  welcome,  receive,  and 
forward  men  and  money  offered  for  its  use,  so  far  as  available 
for  the  purposes  intended  and  in  the  circumstances  of  the 
case.  This  simple  and  comprehensive  principle  of  administra- 
tion, for  the  most  part  consistently  apphed,  enabled  the  Board 
successfully  to  manage  its  complicated  affairs;  to  deal  with 
various  denominations  of  churches,  missionaries  of  many 
minds  and  labels,  controversies  in  the  homeland  or  in  mission 
fields,  and  whatever  perplexing  and  difficult  situations  emerged 
in  this  period. 

While  thus  seeking  to  serve  its  broad  constituency,  the 
Board  was  alert  to  win  new  friends  and  supporters  and  to 
commend  foreign  missions  yet  more  widely.  During  the 
'40s,  when  the  lyceum  was  coming  to  be  a  notable  force  in 
popular  education,  a  scheme  was  devised  for  adapting  it  to 


THE  PERIOD   OF  ADOLESCENCE  155 

missionary  purpose,  and  in  some  cities,  as  in  Boston  at  the 
Odeon,  under  the  auspices  of  a  ''Young  Men's  Society  for 
Diffusing  Missionary  Knowledge,"  distinguished  hterary  men 
were  invited  to  lecture.  At  the  same  time  new  efforts  were 
made  to  interest  young  people.  The  plans  do  not  seem  to 
have  been  novel  or  exciting,  but  they  availed,  and  a  host  of 
juvenile  societies  were  formed  to  hear  missionary  stories  and 
reports,  to  make  contributions,  prepare  garments,  and  engage 
in  other  such  chastened  joys. 

The  lands  that  were  far  off  and  strange  to  the  founders  had 
come  to  seem  nearer  as  the  years  went  by.  They  were  more 
An  accessible.    ''Verily  the  earth  is  helping  the  woman," 

Opening  says  the  annual  report  of  1836.  Railroads  and 
World  steamboats    were    multiplying,   with  their   promise 

of  increased  facilities  of  transportation. 

Not  only  nearer,  as  more  accessible,  but  as  better  known, 
was  the  world  of  1850.  And  herein  the  missionaries  of  the 
Board  had  largely  contributed.  What  prodigious  explorers 
were  those  early  missionaries ;  never  daunted  by  any  hardship 
and  never  satisfied  to  leave  a  corner  of  God's  world  unvisited 
if  only  there  dwelt  in  it  any  who  had  not  heard  the  gospel  of 
God's  redeeming  love!  In  the  description  of  this  period  of 
beginnings  it  has  already  appeared  with  what  painstaking 
the  several  fields  were  traversed  to  determine  the  best  points 
for  occupancy. 

But  beyond  the  lands  chosen  and  tilled  there  was  wide 
exploring  of  fields  that  for  one  reason  or  another  could  not 
be  undertaken.  As  one  instance  of  these  prospected  lands, 
Patagonia  may  be  recalled.  Earlier  investigations  had  been 
made  in  Spanish  America,  and  some  preliminary  work  done 
in  South  America,  particularly  at  Buenos  Ayres.  But  that 
not  eventuating,  in  1833  attention  was  turned  to  Patagonia. 
Her  shores  were  being  visited  every  year  by  sealers;  British 
explorers  were  charting  the  waters  of  her  western  coast  in  the 
interests  of  commerce;  it  was  time  to  inquire  concerning  her 


156  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

most  valuable  possession,  man.  Upon  a  generous  offer  of 
transportation,  the  Board  despatched  Titus  Coan  and  William 
Arms  on  this  errand.  Landing  on  the  southeastern  coast,  they 
spent  more  than  two  months  in  searching  it  over,  only  to  find 
few  Indians  on  the  eastern  shore,  the  way  barred  to  the  west 
and  north,  with  the  necessity  of  reporting  it  inexpedient  then 
to  attempt  a  mission  to  this  country. 

Even  beyond  where  they  could  yet  journey,  the  eyes  of  the 
missionaries  peered  wistfully;  and  the  Board  welcomed  every 
word  of  news  that  could  be  reported  as  to  the  frontier  lands 
and  the  people  yet  unreached.  In  1836  the  Committee  was 
collecting  information  concerning  Tibet  and  the  prospect  of 
entering  it  more  safely  from  Russia  than  from  India.  Afghan- 
istan, also,  was  in  mind,  and  strong  and  devoted  men  were 
being  watched  for  with  a  view  to  these  fields.  The  pages  of 
the  Missionary  Herald  during  this  period  became  a  storehouse 
of  information  gathered  by  keen-eyed  and  true-hearted  ex- 
plorers, searching  out  the  lands  of  darkness  and  need. 

In  1812  the  Board  sent  forth  eight  missionaries,  two  of  the 
men  being  unmarried.  In  1850  there  were  157  ordained 
The  Mis-  missionaries,  besides  teachers,  physicians,  and  wives, 
sionary  395  in  all;  and  there  were  122  native  helpers  in 
Force  various  forms  of  mission  work,  a  company  that  in 

size  would  have  astonished  the  founders.  At  first  there  was 
little  selection  of  candidates;  the  number  who  offered  was  not 
large;  the  work  was  new  and  its  requirements  not  clear. 
But  as  experience  was  gained  and  candidates  multiplied,  and 
especially  when  funds  became  reduced  after  the  panic  of  1837, 
more  care  was  taken  in  the  appointment  of  missionaries.  It 
began  to  be  recognized,  also,  that  the  great  work  of  the  Board's 
missions  was  to  prepare  natives  to  be  the  preachers  and 
teachers  of  their  people.  Deep  and  broad  foundations  of  a 
Christian  education  and  a  Christian  literature  were  therefore 
required,  and  to  that  end  the  really  successful  missionaries 
must  have  eminent  gifts  and  graces.     The  best  that  Christian 


THE  PERIOD  OF  ADOLESCENCE  157 

culture  could  produce  in  America  was  none  too  good  for  the 
foreign  missionary's  task. 

A  closer  examination  of  prospective  missionaries  was  then 
called  for;  first  of  all,  as  to  health,  since  the  missions  had 
suffered  more  from  failure  at  that  point  than  at  any  other. 
The  conclusion  to  which  the  Committee  was  thus  brought  by 
the  experience  of  its  opening  period  of  missionary  work  is 
worth  quoting  in  full:  ''The  whole  history  of  our  missions 
demonstrates  that  their  ultimate  success  depends  far  more, 
humanly  speaking,  on  the  qualifications  of  those  who  form 
them  than  upon  the  number  of  laborers.  A  few  men,  emi- 
nently holy,  and  devoted  to  their  work,  with  vigorous  minds, 
well  disciplined,  and  richly  stored  with  useful  knowledge,  dis- 
creet and  judicious  in  their  plans  and  measures,  full  of  esteem 
and  affection  for  each  other,  and  of  compassionate  kindness 
for  the  perishing  heathen,  accustomed  to  steady,  patient  toil 
and  with  physical  constitutions  capable  of  sustaining  it,  will, 
by  the  blessing  of  God,  accompUsh  far  more  in  training  up 
native  laborers,  and  guiding  them  in  their  work,  exerting  an 
extensive  and  commanding  influence  over  the  people  among 
whom  they  dwell,  and  preparing  the  way  for  great  and  blessed 
changes  in  the  manners,  habits,  and  institutions  of  unevan- 
gelized  men  than  a  multitude  who  do  not  rise  above  mediocrity 
in  these  respects,  or  of  whom  some  are  very  deficient  in  any 
of  them." 

In  the  operation  of  the  missions,  also,  the  experience  of  forty 
years  developed  certain  general  rules  of  policy  and  method. 
Develop-  '^^^  main  features  of  the  work  were  found  to  be 
ment  of  pretty  much  the  same  for  all  fields,  despite  their 
Mission  marked  contrasts  of  condition.  There  were  always 
Policy  languages  to  be  learned  and  a  Christian  literature 

to  be  provided,  hearers  to  be  sought,  disciples  to  be  won, 
schools  to  be  established;  at  length,  churches  to  be  organized, 
a  native  agency  to  be  prepared  and  set  at  work,  self-support 
to  be  encouraged,  home    and  foreign  missions  to  be  stimu- 


158  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

lated.  In  one  way  or  another  all  these  lines  of  effort  were  to 
be  undertaken  by  all  the  missions.  But  in  what  way  and 
order,  with  what  special  emphasis  or  variation  to  suit  the 
particular  case,  was  a  matter  to  be  determined  on  the  ground. 
The  wisdom  of  the  founders  was  shown  in  that  they  sent  forth 
their  first  missionaries  with  so  general  instructions,  allowing 
them  large  freedom  of  action  and  requiring  the  responsibility 
of  decision. 

As  time  went  on,  this  policy  involved  a  more  definite  organ- 
ization of  the  missions.  When  there  was  but  a  handful  of 
Mission  missionaries  closely  associated,  and  all  busy  at  the 
Organiza-  same  kind  of  tasks,  there  was  little  need  of  organ- 
tioii  ization    or    formal    action.     They    could    talk    the 

day's  work  over  and  go  at  it;  they  could  spend  the  funds  in 
hand  as  the  need  was  greatest  before  their  eyes;  they  could 
draw  their  own  supplies  from  the  common  store.  But  as 
numbers  increased,  residences  scattered,  and  lines  of  work  mul- 
tiplied, as  the  part  of  each  worker  became  more  specialized 
and  the  funds  available  less  adequate  to  the  demand,  it  became 
of  increasing  importance  that  the  mission  should  be  thor- 
oughly organized  and  its  action  regular,  businesslike,  and 
decisive. 

The  Board  early  constituted  its  missions  as  communities, 
and  was  the  only  missionary  society  to  adopt  that  system.  As 
soon  as  there  were  three  male  members  in  a  mission  it  was 
expected  so  to  organize,  with  stated  meetings  and  exact  records 
kept  by  a  secretary.  Mission  action  was  to  be  by  majority 
vote,  subject  to  revision  by  the  Prudential  Committee.  The 
mission  was  then  held  accountable  for  the  procedure  of  its 
several  stations  and  its  members.  Experience  tended  to 
increase  the  power  and  responsibihties  of  the  mission  in  some 
directions,  as  it  was  found  they  were  best  able  to  settle  many 
questions  of  method  and  administration;  in  other  fines  it  led 
to  some  restricting  of  their  freedom. 

The  enterprise  itself  had  by  the  close  of  this  period  grown 


THE  PERIOD   OF  ADOLESCENCE  159 

marvelously  in  size  and  scope.     The  single  mission  that  in 

1813  could  scarcely  get  a  foothold  in  India,  the  one  land  that 

then  seemed  at  all  hopeful  for  such  an  enterprise, 

ission  j^^^  ^^^  increased  to  twenty-four,  distributed  in 
ten  of  the  great  countries  of  the  world.  In  all 
these  lands  a  legal  standing  and  a  good  measure  of  protection 
had  now  been  secured.  The  great  object  of  these  missions, 
the  preaching  of  the  gospel,  had  already  been  wrought  into 
various  forms  of  mission  activity,  as  observation  and  experi- 
ment in  the  several  fields  had  pointed  the  way.  Besides  the 
direct  work  of  evangelism  through  preaching  and  the  institu- 
tion of  the  Church,  the  two  outstanding  agencies  that  were 
coming  to  be  used  were  education  and  publication. 

In  the  field  of  publication  the  Board  had  already  accom- 
plished magnificent  results.  By  1850  it  had  twelve  printing 
establishments  in  operation,  issuing  publications  in  thirty 
languages  and  with  an  output  of  37,000,000  pages  in  that  one 
year.  Yet  these  figures  give  but  a  poor  idea  of  what  had 
been  achieved.  The  fact  is  that  the  missionaries  of  the  Board 
had  already  created  a  literature  in  all  these  missions,  notably 
so  in  Ceylon  and  India,  throughout  the  Turkish  empire  and 
in  the  Sandwich  Islands.  For  the  latter  land,  as  for  all  the 
savage  peoples  for  whom  they  toiled,  they  had  even  constructed 
a  written  language,  with  grammar  and  dictionary  already 
issued  or  under  way.  The  inconspicuous  but  monumental 
labors  of  gifted  men  in  many  of  the  early  mission  stations 
had  thus  brought  unpurchasable  help  to  the  uplifting  of  needy 
peoples  and  permanent  honor  to  the  Board. 

In  the  field  of  education,  this  same  year  1850  showed  21,700 
scholars  in  the  free  schools  of  the  Board  (one-half  in  the  Sand- 
wich Islands),  700  or  800  students  in  the  higher  boarding- 
schools  of  the  several  fields,  and  a  half  dozen  training-schools 
preparing  teachers  and  preachers.  Here,  also,  the  figures 
show  the  least  part  of  the  accomplishment.  For  what  had 
been  greatly  done  in  this   period  was  to  awaken  a  thirst  for 


160  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

education  and  the  beginnings  of  a  higher  standard  of  living 
where  knowledge  and  intelUgence  were  to  rule. 

At  the  same  time,  there  were  gathered  into  eighty-five 
churches  on  the  several  fields  over  25,000  members,  nearly 
2000  of  them  added  in  the  year  1850,  which  churches  were 
then  contributing  nearly  $10,000  toward  the  support  of  this 
mission  work.  But  the  numbers  being  reached  and  influenced 
in  those  lands  were  far  beyond  counting,  and  this  circle  of  in- 
fluence was  ever  widening. 

So  established  had  the  Board's  enterprise  become,  so  mani- 
fest the  results,  so  assured  the  main  policies  and  methods, 
that  those  who  watched  over  it  were  confident  of  its  larger 
possibilities.  In  a  paper  read  at  the  annual  meeting  of  1844 
on  ''The  Present  Duty  of  the  Church  to  the  Heathen  World," 
Secretary  Treat  argued  that  it  was  in  the  power  of  Christians 
to  evangelize  the  whole  world  in  less  than  fifty  years.  He 
estimated  the  Board's  share  of  the  non-Christian  world  at 
sixty  million;  he  counted  upon  a  rate  of  increase  in  missionaries 
and  native  workers  in  successive  decades,  so  that  within  the 
appointed  time  there  would  be  one  preacher  to  every  five 
thousand  souls.  To  finance  the  plan  there  would  be  needed 
but  one  cent  a  day  from  each  communicant  in  addition  to 
other  funds  that  could  be  depended  upon.  It  is  a  significant 
and  sobering  fact  that  thus  before  the  end  of  the  first  period 
into  which  the  Board's  history  is  here  divided,  it  was  felt  by 
her  leaders  that  the  evangelization  of  the  world  might  be 
accomplished  two  decades  before  her  centennial  year. 

To  review  the  history  of  the  Board's  growth  during  this 
period  is  to  feel  the  greatness  of  her  founders.  The  general- 
The  ship  in  the  homeland  was  as  marked  as  the  leader- 

Superb  ship  abroad.  The  names  of  Worcester,  Evarts,  and 
Leaders  Anderson  as  secretaries,  and  of  such  laymen  as 
Bartlet,  Read,  Hubbard,  Stoddard,  and  Tappan  upon  the 
Prudential  Committee  recall  some  of  the  noblest  and  most 
serviceable  men  that  Christian  America  has  known. 


SAMUEL    WORCESTER 

Secretary,  1810-1821 


JEREMIAH    EVARTS 

Treasurer,  1811-1822 
Secretanj,  1821-1831 


HENRY    HILL 

Treasurer, 
1822-1854 


GOVERNOR  JOHN  TREADWELL 

President,  1810-1820 


SAMUEL    SPRING 

Vice-President, 
1810-1819 


SOME   FOUNDERS  AND  EARLY  OFFICERS 


THE^  PERIOD  OF  ADOLESCENCE  161 

Their  worth  to  the  American  Board  is  beyond  reckoning. 
Secretary  Worcester  fairly  Ufted  it  into  action  on  the  arms  of  his 
faith.  When  the  question  of  commissioning  the  first  mission- 
aries was  up  and  there  was  not  more  than  $1200  in  the  treasury, 
the  other  two  members  of  the  Committee  hesitated.  Dr. 
Worcester  declared,  ''The  Lord  has  the  key;  and  before  the 
missionaries  have  reached  their  field  of  labor  we  shall  have 
enough  to  pay  their  outfits  and  continue  their  support."  Dr. 
Spring  repUed,  ''Well,  brother  Worcester,  I  don't  know  but 
it  may  be  so,  but  it  seems  to  me  that  you  have  all  the  faith 
there  is  in  the  world";  later  he  added,  "I  do  not  know  what  we 
should  do  without  brother  Worcester.  His  faith  is  equal  to 
everything." 

And  to  faith  was  added  wisdom.  It  was  all  new  work. 
There  were  no  precedents,  records,  or  rules.  The  example  of 
a  few  European  societies  that  were  still  experimenting  was 
their  sole  earthly  guide.  Obstacles  were  enormous;  perplex- 
ities constant  and  increasing;  first  attempts  seemed  destined 
to  pitiful  failure.  In  the  midst  of  it  the  undismayed  vision 
and  ready  tact  of  Worcester  shine  forth;  with  him  and  follow- 
ing him  was  Evarts,  versatile,  prudent,  untiring;  to  his  sup- 
port, with  others,  came  Anderson,  the  statesman,  to  meet  the 
more  intricate  problems  of  the  advancing  years. 

Mistakes  were  made.  Judgment  was  not  always  unerring; 
methods  and  policies  had  sometimes  to  be  revised.  The  marvel 
is  with  what  prescience  the  leaders  saw  the  great  and  abiding 
principles  of  missionary  work.  The  Cornwall  School  was  not 
a  success,  but  the  need  of  training  a  native  agency  was  justly 
perceived.  Tracts  and  books  appearing  from  mission  presses 
were  not  always  well  adapted  for  their  use,  but  the  primary 
importance  of  the  printed  word  was  settled  once  for  all.  The 
schoohng  offered  at  first  in  some  fields  was  hardly  that  most 
needed  by  all  the  pupils,  but  the  value  of  education  as  a  means 
of  Christianizing  every  nation  was  never  to  be  gainsaid.  Indus- 
trial education  may  have  been  unwisely  reduced  in  some  fields, 


162  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  ^OARD 

as  among  the  Indians  and  in  the  Sandwich  Islands,  but  the 
decision  was  right,  the  saintly  John  Eliot  to  the  contrary  not- 
withstanding, that  it  is  not  necessary  to  civilize  a  people  before 
beginning  to  Christianize  them. 

Missionaries  may  have  erred,  and  with  approval  from  the 
homeland,  in  pressing  upon  their  converts  a  provincial  type 
of  thought  or  standard  of  conduct,  and  in  failing  to  make 
sufficient  allowance  for  the  traditions  and  customs  of  those 
whom  they  were  training.  It  is  the  other  side,  however,  that 
is  most  noteworthy:  the  breadth  of  view,  the  sympathy, 
tolerance,  and  tact  that  appear  both  in  the  instructions  given 
those  early  missionaries  and  in  the  way  they  went  about  their 
task.  And  it  is  a  sufficient  answer  to  any  doubt  whether 
their  course  was  on  the  whole  wise,  that  it  won  the  approval 
of  the  high-minded,  both  among  foreign  and  native  observers, 
and  often  overcame  even  the  prejudices  and  opposition  of  those 
who  had  felt  themselves  rebuked  by  the  new  religion. 

By  patient  persistence  and  self-denying  devotion  the  mis- 
sions won  their  way  abroad.  And  by  the  skill,  integrity,  and 
zeal  of  its  management  the  society  won  its  way  at  home.  So 
that  by  1850  the  American  Board  was  honored  the  world 
around.  Its  place,  its  work,  its  efficiency,  its  prestige,  and 
its  claim  were  all  established. 


THE   WATERING,    1860-1880 


The  date  of  beginning  worl 
name  of  the  mission,  also  the 
f erring.  If  the  mission  waa  c! 
1860,    the    date    is    in  parenth 


Smyrna  1820- 

7)  Palestine  1821-1845 

8)  Malta  1822-_ 
)  Syria  1823-(1870) 

10)  Nestorian  1834-1870 

11)  Cyprus  1834-1840 

12)  Central  Turkey  1847- 

13)  European  Turkey  1858- 

14)  Eastern  Turkey  1855- 

Assyria  1850-1860 


THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 


THE  MISSIONS  1810  to  18G0 

Missions  existing  in  1S60  are  marked  thus: 

Madura  f^ 
Missions  previously  in  existence,  and  either 
closed  or  transfered  are  marked  thus: 
Amo^  n 
.  The  political  boundaries  on  map  are  of  the  year  1 


/^'SiamV\ina  n    J 


w^^. 


S  .0 

Philippme  -5  '• 

ol «  ■ 

^1  -J 'Guam 
C^p^  Islands 

.  Caroline 


XL 


region  follows  the 
f  closing  or  trans- 
•  transferred  after 


inton  1830- 
noy  1842-1858 
ochow  1847- 
anghai  1854-1860 
>rth  China  1860- 

im  1831-1850 
igapore  1834-1843 
meo  1838-1852 


36  Palmas  1834-1843 
iboon  1843-(1870) 
uth  Africa  1835- 
ndwich  Is.  1820-1853 
cronesia  1852- 


.c^rr^ 


North  American       _^^ 
Indian  Missions^^ 

1  Cherokees  1817- 
(moved  to  Arkansas  in 

1821  &  1837) 

2  Choctaws  1818-1859 

(moved  to  Arkansas 
in  1828) 

3  Mackinaw  1826-1836 

4  Maumee  1826-1835 

5  Allegheny  1826 

6  Tuscarora  1826-1860 

7  Osage  1826-1836 

8  Chickasaw  1827-1834 

9  Stockbridge  1828-1848 

10  Ojibwas  1831-(1870) 

11  Creeks  1832-1836 

12  Pawnees  1834-1847 

13  Abenaquis  1835-1868 

(in  Canada) 

14  Oregon  1835-1847 

15  Sioux  or  Dakota 

1835-{1883) 


Chapter  IX 

IN  BRITISH  INDIA  AND  CEYLON 

About  the  year  1850  the  situation  in  the  Board's  earliest 

mission  field  was  being  closely  scrutinized.     There  was  much 

to  observe  with  joy  and  gratitude.     In  that  India 

«  ®.  ,®^  which  had  refused  to  let  American  missionaries 
Penod  «       .     . 

enter  m  1813,  a  score  of  missionary  societies  were 

now  at  work,  occupying  300  stations  and  expending  a  mil- 
Uon  dollars  a  year.  And  this  increased  establishment  was 
working  under  greatly  improved  conditions.  Both  government 
and  native  peoples  wpre  more  kindly;  the  progress  of  civiliza- 
tion was  removing  some  difficulties.  Sati  (widow-burning)  had 
been  stopped;  human  sacrifices  occurred  now  only  in  isolated 
cases;  hook-swinging  was  still  practised;  its  occurrence  was 
noted  occasionally  throughout  this  period  and  even  so  late 
as  1895,  but  with  increasing  opposition  so  that  the  government 
finally  suppressed  it.  Native  chiefs  in  the  Punjab  were  coun- 
seling with  officials  to  stop  female  infanticide.  India  was 
becoming  disturbed  over  her  misery;  some  of  her  spokesmen 
even  said  despairingly  that  Hinduism  was  dying.  It  was  a 
good  time  to  press  the  gospel  of  salvation. 

On  its  fields  the  American  Board  rejoiced  in  a  full  share  of 
the  general  improvement.  Yet  it  was  not  satisfied  simply  to 
A  New  go  on  in  the  same  way.  The  missionaries  were 
Method  becoming  absorbed  in  routine  work;  there  was 
Required  danger  that  they  might  be  overwhelmed  with  the 
care  of  schools  and  publications,  much  of  this  care  being  over 
the  teaching  of  secular  knowledge  and  the  preparing  of  secular 

165 


166  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

text-books.  It  seemed  that  preaching  was  Ukely  to  be  neg- 
lected and  the  disposition  to  reach  out  and  evangelize  new 
districts  to  be  choked.  Mr.  Hume  might  declare  that  "the 
missionary  in  the  printing-office  can  do  more  to  make  Christ 
known  among  the  people  than  ten  men  could  do  faithfully 
preaching  daily  in  the  streets  and  bazaars  of  the  city,"  but  a 
Hst  of  pubhcations,  with  the  number  of  copies  circulated,  did 
not  furnish  a  kindling  report  of  a  year's  work  to  most  of  those 
who  supphed  the  funds  for  it.  The  patient  siege  of  a  fortress 
appeals  to  those  who  understand  the  art  of  war;  but  battles 
out  in  the  open  and  with  quicker  results  are  needed  to  hold 
the  enthusiasm  of  most  onlookers.  Both  as  principle  and 
policy  it  was  felt  to  be  desirable  to  spread  out  so  that  each 
missionary  should  be  a  preacher  with  a  section  or  parish  dis- 
tinctively his  own. 

To  this  end  some  rearrangements  in  the  mission  at  Ahmed- 
nagar  were  attempted  so  early  as  1851.  A  second  church 
was  established  there  with  a  separate  plant,  including  schools. 
Village  work  was  developed,  some  of  the  larger  places  now 
being  made  stations,  with  resident  missionaries  and  a  more 
numerous  native  agency.  The  central  boarding-schools  were 
to  be  discontinued  that  village  schools  might  be  stimulated. 
There  were  to  be  as  many  stations  as  missionaries;  each  man 
was  to  cover  his  o^vn  district  and  all  the  forces  of  a  station 
were  to  be  concentrated  upon  evangelism. 

Before  this  radical  change  of  policy  could  be  effected  the 
Board  sent  a  deputation  to  India  and  Ceylon  to  study  the  case 
on  the  ground.  Secretary  Rufus  Anderson  and  Dr. 
Deputation  ^  ^  Thompson  of  the  Prudential  Committee 
landed  in  Bombay  November  2,  1854,  and  spent 
almost  seven  months  in  careful  and  protracted  conference  with 
the  several  missions  in  India  and  Ceylon.  Virtually  the  whole 
theory  and  practise  of  mission  work  was  gone  over.  The 
volume  in  which  were  published  the  proceedings  of  the  depu- 
tation became  an  authority  in  Europe  as  well  as  America  and 


IN  BRITISH   INDIA  AND   CEYLON  167 

caused  Secretary  Anderson  to  be  recognized  as  a  general  of 
first  rank  in  the  missionary  campaign. 

The  first  of  the  two  principal  recommendations  which  the 
deputation  made  to  the  Board  on  its  return  was  that  the 
Restricting  educational  work  of  the  mission  should  be  limited 
the  to  providing  for  the  Christian  community  and  that 

Schools  teaching  should  be  for  the  most  part  in  the  ver- 
nacular. As  it  was  now,  there  were  coming  to  the  seminaries 
and  higher  schools  an  ever-increasing  number  who  wished  only 
the  commercial  benefits  of  education;  they  had  no  liking  for 
Christianity;  their  presence  lowered  the  morale,  made  it  more 
difficult  to  impress  Christian  teaching  upon  the  other  scholars, 
and  tended  to  secularize  the  instruction.  It  was  not  the  mis- 
sionaries' business  to  train  Hindu  boys  to  earn  a  better  living; 
the  general  work  of  education  for  India  belonged  to  the  State; 
the  Church  should  not  mix  in  it.  The  mission  schools  should 
be  for  the  children  of  the  mission;  the  institutions  of  higher 
grade  should  be  only  for  the  training  of  native  workers;  to 
them  only  was  there  any  need  of  teaching  English. 

So  said  the  advocates  of  a  narrower  educational  policy. 
The  deputation  accepted  this  view;  from  what  had  been  already 
attempted  in  Ahmednagar  it  would  seem  that  they  went  to 
India  with  a  strong  prejudice  toward  it.  In  the  conferences 
some  missionaries  felt  that  small  regard  was  shown  for  any 
other  opinion.  But,  plausible  as  is  the  argument  and  high 
as  is  the  endorsement  of  so  astute  an  administrator  as  Secre- 
tary Anderson,  the  judgment  of  the  deputation  was  wrong,  as 
the  event  showed.  It  was  a  reversal  to  the  principle  which 
Alexander  Duff  had  discredited  twenty  years  before.  The 
advantage  of  the  broader  policy  for  really  influencing  India 
and  sowing  Christian  truth  wide  over  the  land  is  now  all  but 
unquestioned.  To  it,  as  will  appear,  the  Board  was  at  length 
compelled  to  return. 

The  second  conclusion  to  which  the  deputation  came  was 
to  press  the  organization  of  churches  together  with  the  accept- 


168  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

ance  of  self-support  and  the  creation  of  a  native  ministry. 
Here  was  the  great  advance  in  mission  pohcy  to  which  the 
Establish-  deputation  brought  the  Board  at  the  beginning  of 
ingthe  this  new  period.  Hitherto  the  missionaries  had 
Native  been  slow  to  entrust  any  authority  to  the  native 

Church  Christians,  who,  for  the  most  part,  were  disinclined 
to  assume  responsibility.  The  missionaries  had  been  pastors 
of  the  native  churches.  And  the  churches  were  yet  few, 
located  at  the  mission  stations  and  still  composed  largely  of 
students  in  the  schools  and  of  mission  helpers,  most  of  whom 
were  in  one  way  or  another  dependent  on  mission  aid. 

Such  a  condition  was  unavoidable  in  the  earlier  years;  but 
now,  with  foundations  laid,  communities  formed,  individuals 
educated,  the  Bible  and  other  Hterature  in  the  vernacular, 
and  a  second  generation  of  Christian  youth  growing  up  to 
efficiency,  it  was  time  to  constitute  the  native  church  as  an 
organism  having  life  in  itself  that  should  bring  forth  after  its 
kind  through  all  the  land,  or  in  Secretary  Anderson's  immortal 
phrase,  ''a  self-supporting,  self-governing,  and  self-propagating 
church." 

The  report  of  the  deputation  was  clear  on  this  point  and 
convincing.  Undisputed  now,  it  was  a  new  and  bold  pohcy 
to  declare  in  the  '50s;  it  arrested  the  attention  of  other  mis- 
sion boards  and  at  length  was  accepted  by  those  of  the  Congre- 
gational type  as  being  the  only  justifiable  principle  by  which 
to  transplant  vital  Christianity  from  one  land  to  another. 

These  two  recommendations  of  its  deputation  were  not 
accepted  by  the  Board  off-hand.  Presented  at  the  annual 
The  meeting  at  Utica,  in  1855,  they  were  referred  to  a 

Board's  committee  of  thirteen  who  entered  into  corre- 
Approval  spondence  with  all  the  missions  visited,  including 
those  of  Syria  and  Turkey,  which  Secretary  Anderson  had 
inspected  on  his  return  journey,  and  where  also  it  was  intended 
to  make  these  changes  of  policy.  This  committee  presented 
a  very  full  and  elaborate  report  at  a  special  meeting  held  at 


IN  BRITISH   INDIA  AND   CEYLON  169 

Albany  the  following  March,  when  the  much-discussed  pro- 
posals were  at  length  adopted  after  considerable  questioning 
and  demur. 

The  readjustme.  t  of  work  to  conform  to  the  new  pohcies 
was  promptly  undertaken.  At  Ahmednagar  the  plans  already 
The  outUned   were    now    more  fully  set   in   operation. 

Effect  in  A  tour  up  the  Godavari  valley,  on  which  the  mis- 
India  sionaries  had  been  accompanied  by  the  deputation 
during  its  visit  to  this  station,  had  revealed  the  immense  oppor- 
tunity in  these  regions  as  yet  little  touched,  and  the  need  of 
pressing  out  from  the  centers  to  the  districts  beyond.  A 
fresh  impulse  was  thus  given  to  the  work  of  touring. 

The  situation  in  the  Madura  Mission  was  somewhat  different. 
From  the  one  station,  opened  in  Madura  city  in  1834,  before 
the  deputation  arrived  there  had  come  to  be  ten  stations, 
whose  missionaries  had  oversight  of  a  hundred  villages  scat- 
tered over  a  territory  larger  than  the  state  of  Massachusetts. 
Here  each  man  had  his  touring  bandy  or  cart,  with  his  portable 
cot  and  table,  and  it  was  a  part  of  his  regular  monthly  work 
to  go  into  the  outlying  regions,  not  only  to  visit  villages  where 
there  were  Christian  congregations,  but  those  also  where  there 
were  none,  of  which  one  missionary  could  report  ''probably  five 
hundred."  So  that  the  need  of  this  field  at  the  time  of  the 
deputation's  visit  was  not  so  much  for  expansion  as  for  thor- 
ough cultivation. 

The  service  which  the  visitors  rendered  to  Madura,  as  else- 
where, was  in  urging  a  larger  dependence  on  the  native  agency, 
with  a  more  determined  effort  to  put  responsibility  on  the 
native  Christians,  and  to  provide  them  leaders  from  their 
own  number.  The  missionaries  were  not  strangers  to  these 
ideas;  they  had  sounded  them  in  many  reports  to  the  Board. 
But  in  view  of  all  the  difficulties  in  the  way,  little  progress 
was  making  in  that  direction.  It  was  of  advantage  that  the 
Board  through  its  representatives  should  restate  and  approve 
the  principle  and  recommend  steps  to  press  its  more  rapid 


170  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

operation.  The  mischief  was  that  in  closing  the  higher  schools 
and  reorganizing  the  system  of  education  they  weakened  the 
very  forces  that  were  necessary  to  the  end  in  view.  Yet  they 
did  put  a  new  emphasis  on  the  evangelist]  ,  side  of  the  work. 
These  results  followed  their  visit:  churches  increased,  which, 
if  small  and  feeble,  "hardly  knowing  their  right  hand  from 
their  left"  ecclesiastically,  were  yet  alive  and  growing;  the 
EngHsh  mission  school  was  discontinued,  and  the  vernacular 
training  of  the  native  agency  was  pressed. 

The  Ceylon  Mission  got  a  quick  start,  and,  under  more  favor- 
able conditions  than  at  Bombay,  won  earlier  success.  Yet 
The  when  the  deputation  arrived  at  Jaffna  they  found 

Bearing  in  that  the  missionaries  there  had  many  trials  and 
Ceylon  discouragements.  After  thirty  years  of  labor  there 
was  but  one  congregation  in  each  station,  and  that  composed 
almost  entirely  of  beneficiaries  and  paid  helpers.  These 
station  groups  expected  the  ministry  of  a  missionary;  there 
were  no  flocks  for  the  native  pastors.  All  the  pupils  in  the 
girls'  schools  had  been  secured  by  gifts  or  such  inducements  as 
virtually  bought  their  attendance;  and  Batticotta  Seminary, 
the  crown  and  pride  of  the  educational  work  of  the  mission, 
whose  maintenance  had  cost  $100,000,  was  turning  out  chiefly 
candidates  for  government  service,  young  men  without  Chris- 
tian sympathies,  whose  influence  hindered  the  religious  Hfe 
of  their  fellow  students. 

There  was  another  side  to  the  story.  It  was  the  poHcy  of 
this  mission  to  allow  the  church  members  to  live  in  the  villages 
among  their  non-Christian  kindred.  The  leaven  of  Christianity, 
if  hidden,  was  working  in  the  lump.  And  the  influence  of 
Batticotta  graduates  was  in  many  ways  working  good  for  the 
national  life;  they  were  breaking  down  hurtful  traditions  and 
superstitions.  Of  late,  too,  a  new  interest  was  showing  itself 
in  the  building  of  village  chapels. 

Here,  as  in  other  missions,  the  deputation's  visit  made  for 
a  new  emphasis  upon  evangelism  and  the  native  church.     A 


IN  BRITISH  INDIA  AND   CEYLON  171 

native  evangelical  society  had  been  vigorously  at  work  so 
early  as  1851,  and  was  winning  converts  outside  the  stations. 
The  service  of  this  native  agency  was  now  given  greater 
attention.  Batticotta  Seminary  was  reorganized  as  a  training- 
school  for  preachers  and  teachers,  and  the  Oodooville  boarding- 
school  for  girls  was  correspondingly  restricted.  Enghsh  schools 
were  cut  down  and  the  effort  to  provide  general  education  for 
those  outside  the  Christian  community  was  abandoned.  After 
1855  there  were  no  more  "gifts"  to  pupils  in  the  girls'  school. 
At  the  same  time  the  mission  press  was  turned  over  to  the 
natives,  and  the  mission  went  out  of  the  printing  business. 
The  Morning  Star,  a  bi-monthly  paper  which  had  gained  wide 
attention  for  Christianity  among  educated  natives,  was  con- 
tinued imder  the  new  control  of  the  press,  as  it  is  to  this 
day. 

So  sudden  and  radical  a  change  in  the  school  system  was 
inevitably  depressing.  Numbers  were  greatly  reduced;  Batti- 
cotta, which  some  years  before  had  160  pupils,  began  its  new 
regime  with  sixteen;  when  English  courses  were  stopped, 
those  who  sought  only  a  business  education  dropped  out. 
As  one  result,  an  English  high  school,  entirely  under  native 
control,  self-supporting  and  thoroughly  Christian  in  its  manage- 
ment, was  started  and  became  immediately  successful.  Appar- 
ently it  was  not  necessary  to  furnish  education  free  in  order 
to  secure  pupils.  On  the  whole,  there  was  agreement,  for  a 
time  at  least,  in  standing  by  the  new  system.  It  was  believed 
that  Batticotta  was  to  have  its  own  constituency  and  field 
of  service. 

To  add  to  the  burden  in  this  time  of  reconstruction  came 
violent  epidemics  of  cholera  and  smallpox  and  a  prolonged 
drought.  Thousands  died  in  the  close-packed  villages  over 
which  the  contagion  raged;  schools  were  broken  up;  relief 
work  became  pressing  and  missionaries  were  absorbed  in  it; 
the  mission  ''looked  like  a  wrecked  vessel." 

In  1851  the  Board  began  a  new  mission  in  India  and  equipped 


172  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

it  with  ;iiissionaries  all  from  one  family.  An  English  society 
turned  over  to  the  American  Board  its  work  in  the  North  Arcot 
The  Arcot  district,  a  region  containing  more  than  a  million 
Mission,  souls,  to  which  Dr.  Henry  Martyn  Scudder  was 
^851  transferred  from  Madras,  some  seventy-five  miles  to 

the  east.  Dr.  Scudder's  medical  skill  won  attention,  and  his 
ability  to  use  the  Tamil  speech  brought  him  a  crowd  of  hearers 
whenever  he  preached  in  the  streets  of  Arcot.  Two  years 
after,  he  was  joined  by  his  brother,  William  W.  Scudder,  and 
three  years  later  by  three  other  brothers  and  a  sister.  Three 
stations  were  soon  occupied.  Every  member  of  the  mission 
had  been  born  in  India,  could  speak  the  language  fluently, 
knew  the  Indian  life  and  temper,  and  was  by  nature  a  preacher, 
so  that  the  mission  was  preeminently  evangelistic  in  its  method. 
Soon  the  brethren  could  say,  ''The  gospel  has  been  fully 
preached  in  almost  every  street  of  our  stations." 

By  1856  five  churches  were  organized,  and  a  half  dozen 
schools,  using  only  the  vernacular,  were  training  the  children 
of  Christians.  No  attempt  was  made  to  teach  others,  though 
thousands  of  pupils  could  have  been  secured.  In  1857,  when 
the  Reformed  Church  in  America  withdrew  from  union  with 
the  American  Board  to  organize  its  own  foreign  missionary 
society,  the  Arcot  Mission  was  transferred  to  it.  Thereafter 
its  story  becomes  a  chapter  in  the  noble  history  of  that  sister 
society. 

The  Sepoy  Mutiny  of  1857-58  did  not  touch  the  missions 
of  the  American  Board  which  were  outside  the  zone  of  violence. 
In  Ahmednagar,  which  felt  most  the  general  shock 
^.  to  the  country,  the  effect  on  the  people  was  for  a 

time  unhappy,  though  the  regular  lines  of  work, 
including  street  preaching,  were  maintained.  One  benefit 
which  accrued  out  of  the  general  horror  was  the  good  witness 
borne  by  the  native  Christians.  The  arguments  of  many 
critics  of  missions  in  India  were  then  disproved,  as,  frightened 
into  silence,  they  watched  the  course  of  that  incredible  mutiny 


IN  BRITISH   INDIA  AND   CEYLON  173 

and  marked,  over  against  the  treachery,  cruelty,  and  wild 
fanaticism  of  the  raw  Hindu,  the  loyalty  of  the  despised  native 
converts. 

It  was  not  only  in  that  crisis  that  the  testimony  was  borne. 
The  new  man  in  Christ  Jesus  was  now  to  be  recognized  on  all 
these  fields.  Such  an  one  was  Yesuba  Powar.  When  returning 
from  Benares  to  his  home,  800  miles  away,  in  the  yellow  garb 
of  a  pilgrim  and  devotee,  he  had  won  great  esteem  by  bearing 
on  his  shoulder  all  the  way  a  load  of  Ganges  water,  something 
no  Mahar  had  ever  done  before.  But  when  a  few  years  after- 
ward he  visited  Ahmednagar,  where  he  had  an  elder  brother 
who  was  a  Christian,  he  soon  cast  aside  his  pilgrim  dress, 
declared  himself  a  disciple,  and  for  the  remaining  years  of  his 
life  was  a  loved  and  efficient  preacher  of  the  gospel  and  a 
companion  to  the  missionaries  on  their  long  tours  into  new 
regions. 

Another  shining  witness,  also  named  Yesuba  and  also  a 
Mahar,  had  been  an  ambitious  and  well-to-do  cattle  trader. 
When  he  became  a  Christian  in  1850,  his  cattle  and  horses 
were  poisoned  until  all  were  gone.  But,  like  Job,  he  would 
not  deny  his  Lord.  At  last  his  persecutors,  finding  they  could 
not  prevail,  let  him  alone  and  he  resumed  his  business.  Hos- 
pitable and  generous,  openly  breaking  caste,  eating  and  drinking 
with  the  lowest  Mangs,  devoted  to  his  church,  of  which  he 
became  a  deacon,  he  was  acknowledged  even  by  his  enemies 
to  be  a  genuine  Christian. 

While  such  good  testimony  was  being  borne  within  the 
Christian  community,  it  was  winning  the  approval  of  intelli- 
gent and  influential  observers.  In  1859  Lord  Elphinstone, 
governor  of  Bombay,  on  an  official  visit  to  Ahmednagar  volun- 
tarily came  to  the  mission  schools  and  emphasized  his  approval 
of  them  with  a  generous  gift,  as  did  also  his  successor.  Sir 
Bartle  Frere,  in  1863.  And  when,  during  the  Civil  War  in 
the  United  States,  British  friends  in  India  joined  the  native 
churches  in  extra  gifts  that  the  Board's  work  might  not  suffer. 


174  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

they  expressed  their  practical  endorsement  of  the  work  which 
they  had  seen  with  their  own  eyes. 

The  plague  of  caste  continued  to  disturb  mission  life  and 
to  hinder  Christian  progress.  A  fresh  outbreak  of  this  trial 
Another  occurred  in  the  Marathi  Mission  in  the  early  '60s. 
Struggle  In  one  of  the  villages,  when  a  young  man  from  the 
with  Caste  Mang  caste  came  to  his  first  communion,  the  neigh- 
bors of  the  Christians  filled  the  rear  seats  in  the  chapel  to  see 
what  would  happen,  and  when  all  drank  of  the  cup  they  rushed 
from  the  room.  In  another  village  a  Mang  convert  made  a 
feast,  inviting  a  catechist  and  all  the  church,  purposely  to 
test  whether  they  would  receive  him  to  fellowship.  A  bitter 
persecution  ensued,  but  the  Christians  did  not  shrink.  Their 
neighbors  would  give  them  neither  fire,  wood,  nor  water;  they 
threatened  to  drive  them  from  the  village  and  their  business. 
Some  famihes  were  broken  up  by  the  test,  but  the  Christians 
stood  firm  and  other  Mangs  were  won.  Sometimes  the  caste- 
bound  onlookers  commended  the  consistency  of  the  Chris- 
tians' action.  When  they  saw  Mahars  and  Mangs  sitting 
together  at  the  Lord's  table,  they  said,  ''This  is  as  it  should 
be;  we  are  now  convinced  of  your  sincerity." 

At  this  time  there  were  clear  signs  of  a  quickening  life  in 
the  Marathi  Mission.  Doors  were  opening  throughout  both 
the  Konkan  and  the  Deccan.  In  the  Ahmednagar 
G  wth  district  there  were  now  five  stations,  and  it  was 
proved  that  village  stations  could  be  sustained. 
The  new  pohcy  of  pushing  the  missionaries  out  from  the  few 
centers  was  spreading  the  work;  Christians  appeared  wherever 
the  missionaries  turned.  Churches  were  increasing  and 
members  multiplying.  In  the  last  four  years  five  times  as 
many  members  had  been  added  as  in  any  similar  period  before. 
At  the  annual  meeting  of  the  mission,  in  1860,  more  than  400 
native  Christians  sat  down  at  the  table  of  the  Lord.  Adher- 
ents were  now  coming  from  all  castes,  Brahmans,  Mahars, 
Mangs,  and  Bhils,  as  well  as  from  the  Mohammedans. 


IN  BRITISH   INDIA  AND  CEYLON  175 

The  railroad  was  helping  to  extend  the  mission.  In  1861 
there  was  a  line  from  Bombay  into  the  Deccan,  and  the  several 
stations,  including  one  just  established  at  Sholapur,  were  all 
connected  by  telegraph.  The  Marathi  Mission  was  now  formed 
out  of  the  hitherto  independent  missions  at  Bombay,  Ahmed- 
nagar,  and  Satara;  Kolapur  being  discontinued  as  outside  the 
pale  of  British  authority. 

To  meet  the  responsibihties  of  this  quickened  life  the  mission 
force  was  quite  inadequate.  It  had  been  depleted  by  deaths 
Developing  and  other  removals  and  but  slightly  reenforced. 
Native  Only  seven  men  were  in  the  field  in  1868.     It  was, 

Leadership  therefore,  doubly  fortunate  that  the  creation  of  a 
native  pastorate,  which  the  deputation  had  urged  a  decade 
earlier,  now  received  the  hearty  approval  of  the  churches. 
At  first  they  had  been  reluctant  to  accept  others  than  mis- 
sionaries for  their  pastors;  the  change  of  feeling  was  so  sudden 
and  strong  as  to  amount  to  an  epoch  in  the  mission's  history. 
In  a  short  time  seven  men  were  ordained  in  churches  to  which 
they  were  called;  their  work  approved  itself  to  all  and  the 
victory  was  won.  This  movement  carried  with  it  the  develop- 
ment of  self-support;  the  self-governing  church  should  maintain 
itself.  In  1874  the  church  at  Sholapur  started  as  a  self-sup- 
porting body,  the  first  of  its  kind  in  the  Bombay  Presidency. 

In  these  and  other  ways  there  were  unmistakable  signs  that 
Christianity  was  working  into  the  native  life  and  being  adapted 
to  its  situation  and  needs.  A  striking  instance  of  the  mingling 
of  the  new  faith  with  the  old  forms  appeared  in  the  adaptation 
by  Marathi  Christians  of  the  Kirttan,  a  Hindu  exercise  in 
which  a  gosavi,  or  religious  teacher,  celebrates  the  praises 
of  his  god  with  both  vocal  and  instrumental  music.  Such  an 
adapted  Kirttan  was  composed  by  a  native  Christian  on  the 
subject  of  the  Man  of  Calvary  and  sung  at  the  mission  anni- 
versary at  Ahmednagar  in  1862.  Here  was  an  avenue  to 
men's  hearts  particularly  adapted  to  the  people  of  India.  All 
the  East  loves  poetry;  the  Tamil  people,   tiring  of   a  plain 


176  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN   BOARD 

address,  would  listen  willingly  to  the  same  thing  in  verse.  In 
Madura  and  Ceylon  as  well  as  in  the  Marathi  Mission  Chris- 
tian natives  began  to  compose  Christian  songs. 

While  such  advances  were  being  made  in  the  Marathi  field, 
the  Madura  Mission  was  rejoicing  in  a  pervasive  religious 
The  awakening.     The  need  of  it  had  been  a  weight  on 

Revival  in  the  missionaries'  hearts,  the  burden  of  much  prayer. 
Madura,  Suddenly  the  presence  of  a  new  spirit  was  felt. 
1860-61  Beginning  in  an  adjoining  field  of  the  Church 
Missionary  Society,  it  soon  appeared  in  the  American  Board 
mission  near  Tirumangalam.  Mr.  Merrick  found  there  in 
January,  1861,  such  scenes  as  he  had  never  before  witnessed 
in  India,  and  such  as  recalled  revivals  in  the  homeland. 
There  was  great  seriousness,  a  deep  sense  of  sin,  earnest 
inquiry,  and  the  breaking  down  of  barriers.  Without  warn- 
ing, at  Pasumalai  Seminary  students  were  found  in  tears 
bewailing  their  sins.  The  missionaries  sought  to  quiet  excite- 
ment, but  feehngs  were  too  intense  to  be  suppressed.  For  the 
remaining  days  of  the  school  term  but  little  study  or  work 
could  be  maintained.  Day  and  night,  teachers  and  pupils 
were  absorbed  in  the  concerns  of  religion.  So  deep  and  effect- 
ive was  this  revival  that  its  force  was  not  broken  by  the 
school  vacation;  its  influence  was  carried  to  the  homes  of  the 
pupils,  and  returned  with  them  at  the  new  term.  The  girls' 
boarding-school  at  Madura  was  also  stirred.  Within  two 
years  170  members  were  added  to  the  churches. 

The  new  educational  policy  recommended  by  the  deputa- 
tion was  loyally  attempted  and  followed  for  a  while.  Provi- 
Develop-  sion  was  made  for  various  grades  of  students  in 
mentofthe  the  seminary,  and  most  of  the  instruction  was  kept 
Mission  [^  iy^q  vernacular.  In  the  effort  to  develop  the 
village  work,  new  emphasis  was  put  upon  their  schools.  But 
the  situation  soon  became  so  unsatisfactory  that  it  was  neces- 
sary to  make  readjustments.  Small  boarding-schools,  some- 
times one  for  each  sex,  were  organized  in  1865  at  stations 


IN  BRITISH   INDIA  AND   CEYLON  177 

where  there  were  resident  missionaries.  Through  these  station 
schools  it  was  meant  to  discover  boys  and  girls  of  promise 
who  might  be  trained  to  be  leaders  of  their  people.  By  1870 
Pasumalai  Seminary  was  made  distinctively  a  theological 
training-school,  and  the  girls'  boarding-school  at  Madura  was 
transferred  thither,  to  become  a  female  seminary  preparing 
the  future  wives  of  native  helpers.  The  native  agency  was 
developing  fast.  By  1868  five  classes  could  be  named:  pastors, 
catechists,  readers,  teachers  of  boarding  and  station  schools, 
and  masters  and  mistresses  of  the  common  schools.  The 
church  life  showed  the  quickening  effect  of  the  revival; 
membership  was  growing  at  a  more  rapid  rate;  self-support 
was  being  pressed.  The  generous  giving  of  some  churches  and 
individuals  impressed  the  missionaries.  Many  accepted  the 
law  of  the  tithe,  which  the  native  helper,  Abraham,  cham- 
pioned, quoting  as  authority  his  ancestor  who  gave  tithes  to 
Melchizedek. 

The  missionaries  here,  as  in  West  India,  had  been  encour- 
aged by  the  deputation  to  more  systematic  touring.  The 
work  in  the  centers  was  absorbing;  it  seemed  as  though  they 
could  not  attempt  more;  they  called  loudly  for  reenforcements, 
and  for  this  type,  touring  missionaries.  But  not  getting  them, 
they  went  at  it  themselves.  By  1864  they  had  formed  a  plan 
of  systematic  itineration  which  looked  to  the  evangelizing  of 
the  entire  field.  So  far  as  circumstances  would  permit,  all 
the  missionaries  were  expected  to  engage  in  it.  From  June 
to  August  they  went  forth  by  twos,  taking  native  catechists 
with  them.  So  they  visited  over  300  villages  and  preached 
to  20,000  persons,  distributing  books  and  papers  as  they  had 
opportunity. 

A  new  and  rewarding  field  of  labor  was  thus  opened  as  new 
territory  was  explored  [and  acquaintance  widened.  Encourag- 
ing signs  appeared  that  idolatry  was  losing  power  in  some  sec- 
tions. Few  new  temples  were  rising;  it  was  increasingly 
difficult  at  the  festivals  to  find  those  who  would  draw  the 


178  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

idol  car.  In  one  place  a  reduction  in  the  size  of  the  car  was 
proposed  that  it  might  be  draAvn  more  easily,  but  this  the 
Brahmans  refused.  The  waning  of  idolatry  did  not  mean  in 
all  cases  an  inclination  toward  Christianity.  Missionaries 
found  a  temper  which  they  regarded  as  a  transitional  infidehty, 
making  the  time  favorable  for  pressing  the  gospel.  Happy 
were  the  men  and  women  called  of  God  to  spend  their  Hves  at 
this  task;  they  marveled  that  others  were  not  eager  to  join  them. 

Mission  work  in  Ceylon  was  now  in  its  second  stage.  The 
novelty  of  Christianity  had  passed;  the  zeal  of  the  early  con- 
Upbuilding  verts  had  cooled  somewhat,  as  happens  in  older 
in  Ceylon,  Christian  lands.  Among  the  people  there  was  less 
i860  opposition,  but  more  indifference.     Christianity  had 

been  given  a  place  in  the  land  with  Hinduism  and  Moham- 
medanism; it  was  proper  that  it  should  be  practised  by  those 
who  had  accepted  it,  but  not  pressed  upon  those  of  other 
faiths.  The  chill  of  this  prevailing  temper  passed  at  length 
as  fresh  revivals  came,  not  so  intense  as  in  earlier  years,  but 
more  widely  effective.  The  villages  all  over  the  field  now 
felt  the  influence;  little  by  little  the  churches  grew  stronger 
and  more  efficient.  Their  liberafity  was  notable.  In  1867 
the  Batticotta  church  became  independent,  two  of  its  members 
agreeing  each  to  pay  a  month's  salary  of  the  pastor,  and  a 
third  as  much  annually  as  under  his  old  refigion  he  would 
pay  for  ceremonies  for  his  deceased  parents. 

In  the  year  1867  ten  churches  were  organized,  and  when 
another  outbreak  of  cholera  came  and  the  station  routine  was 
broken  up,  the  missionaries  being  absorbed  in  relief  work,  the 
care  of  churches  and  outlying  districts  was  in  good  measure 
assumed  by  the  church  members.  Native  pastors  and  teachers 
took  increasing  direction  of  work  in  the  villages,  even  conduct- 
ing the  moonhght  preaching  services  which  have  been  a  feature 
of  the  work  in  Ceylon,  and  maintaining  the  house  to  house 
visitation,  also  a  characteristic  of  this  mission's  method.  Even 
in  that  preoccupied  year,   1867,  there  were  11,000  calls  thus 


IN  BRITISH   INDIA  AND   CEYLON  179 

made  by  traveling  colporters,  and  more  than  three  times  that 
number  of  personal  conversations  with  adults  in  their  local 
fields,  while  the  daily  calls  of  village  teachers  and  catechists 
reached  13,000  in  one  station  alone. 

Meanwhile  other  forms  of  activity  were  developing.  Dr. 
S.  F.  Green,  with  no  such  hospital  or  equipment  as  every 
medical  missionary  now  deems  essential,  was  doing  important 
work,  conducting  a  dispensary,  preparing  medical  books, 
teaching  a  medical  class,  and  treating  over  a  thousand  patients, 
besides  preaching  the  gospel  to  all  who  came  within  his 
reach. 

While,  in  conforming  to  the  new  policy  of  the  Board,  the 
higher  schools  of  this  mission  had  suffered  loss  both  in  numbers 
and  influence,  the  village  vernacular  schools,  sixty  in  number, 
were  flourishing,  with  over  2000  pupils  in  them.  The  higher 
schools  had  found  a  new  and  fine  career  in  preparing  students 
for  direct  Christian  work,  and  the  desire  for  higher  general 
education  was  again  beginning  to  press  its  claim.  In  1867 
the  native  Christians  of  different  Protestant  missions  proposed 
a  Christian  college;  the  American  Board  missionaries  were 
asked  to  serve  as  trustees,  and  the  sum  of  $25,000  was  solicited 
as  a  fund  to  start  Jaffna  College. 

As  the  Ceylon  Mission  moved  into  the  70s  it  was  evident 
that  it  had  won  a  people  to  the  service  of  Christianity.  A 
Christian  Vernacular  Education  Society,  cooperating  with  the 
three  mission  boards  in  the  land,  was  one  signal  help  to  the 
missionaries;  another  was  a  native  Evangehcal  Society,  into 
which  was  poured  the  deepening  religious  zeal  of  the  churches. 
This  was  their  ''board  of  foreign  missions,"  conducting  work 
in  the  islands  south  of  Jaffna,  and  holding  the  hearts  of  its 
constituency  as  surely  as  does  the  American  Board.  The  pro- 
jected Jaffna  College  was  begun  in  1872,  and  its  prosperity 
was  immediate,  both  in  students  and  support  exceeding  all 
expectations.  By  1878  its  certificates  were  recognized  by  the 
principal  medical  officer  in  Ceylon  as  of  equal  value  with  the 


180  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

India  University  matriculation  certificates.  The  care  of 
mission  schools  was  now  given  over  to  a  Board  of  Education, 
composed  of  pastors  and  laymen,  acting  in  cooperation  with 
the  government. 

When  Dr.  Levi  Spaulding  died,  in  1873,  fifty-four  years 
after  he  sailed  from  America,  and  after  rendering  longer  active 
service  than  any  other  missionary  of  the  Board,  he  had  wit- 
nessed almost  the  entire  process  of  a  mission,  from  its  planting 
on  a  foreign  shore  to  its  incorporation  into  the  fife  of  a  people. 
Limited  in  area  as  it  was,  the  Ceylon  Mission  could  probably 
be  said  with  truth  to  be  "a  field  thoroughly  worked  beyond 
that  of  any  other  mission  of  the  American  Board."  The 
missionaries  began  to  think  that  it  could  soon  be  turned  over 
entirely  to  the  native  church. 

The  Madras  Mission  since  its  opening  in  1836  had  been 
particularly  the  headquarters  for  the  publication  work  for 
Madras  Tamil-speaking  peoples.  For  nearly  thirty  years 
Closed,  Miron  Winslow,  its  scholar,  and  Phineas  Hunt,  its 
i866  printer,  with  occasional  help  from  some  colleagues, 

issued  a  remarkable  stream  of  Christian  literature.  Winslow's 
fife  work,  a  Tamil-EngHsh  dictionary,  the  most  notable  work 
of  its  kind  at  that  time  in  any  language  of  India,  was  com- 
pleted in  1862.  When,  in  1864,  after  forty-five  years  of 
service,  Mr.  Winslow  died  at  Cape  Town,  on  furlough  to  the 
homeland,  it  was  felt  that  the  time  had  come  to  close  this 
mission,  whose  special  service  was  done.  The  printing  es- 
tablishment, developed  until  it  was  valued  at  $28,000,  now 
passed  into  other  hands,  and  Mr.  Hunt,  ''without  hesitation," 
as  he  wrote,  ''and  with  pure  dehght,"  pushed  on  to  become 
the  printer  of  the  North  China  Mission. 

It  was  in  the  '70s  that  the  reports  from  the  fields  in 
Woman's  India  and  Ceylon  began  to  tell  of  new  efforts  by 
Work  for  the  women  of  the  missions  for  the  women  of  the 
Woman  land.  In  the  years  preceding  it  had  not  been  found 
easy   to   reach  the  women  through  the  usual  forms  of  mis- 


IN  BRITISH  INDIA  AND   CEYLON  181 

sionary  work.  At  length  the  advent  of  the  Bible  woman,  a 
native  Christian  worker,  giving  part  or  all  of  her  time  to  read- 
ing the  Scriptures  and  teaching  gospel  truths  in  the  homes  of 
the  people,  pointed  the  way  of  success.  With  the  organization 
of  the  Woman's  Board  of  Missions  and  the  appointment  of 
unmarried  missionary  ladies,  work  for  women  became  a  dis- 
tinct department  of  labor.  The  way  was  readily  opened  for 
the  unmarried  women  of  the  mission  to  visit  the  homes  even  of 
the  rich  and  high  caste  to  instruct  the  women  there.  Soon 
they  had  created  a  hunger  for  knowledge;  before  long,  more 
calls  than  could  be  met  came  from  women  of  high-caste  famihes 
to  be  taught  to  read.  The  lower  castes  were  likewise  fired 
with  a  zeal  to  learn.  In  a  village  in  Jaffna  every  woman  but 
one,  who  was  prevented  by  poor  eyesight,  was  learning  to  read. 
Under  the  direction  of  the  missionary  ladies,  the  number  of 
Bible  women  rapidly  increased.  In  some  of  the  stations, 
notably  in  the  Marathi  Mission,  where  no  women  were  em- 
ployed at  first,  the  wives  of  pastors  and  catechists  undertook 
this  work  so  far  as  home  cares  would  allow. 

With  the  touring  of  the  American  women  into  villages  for 
tent  meetings,  a  new  interest  appeared;  in  one  village  they 
met  as  many  as  800  of  their  sex.  There  was  special  value 
in  reaching  the  women  of  Ceylon;  for  they  were  the  true 
property  holders,  real  estate  being  largely  the  dowry  of  the 
women,  handed  down  from  mother  to  daughter,  and  not 
to  be  touched  without  their  consent.  To  reach  the  women 
was  to  win  immense  aid  in  the  furtherance  of  the  gospel.  That 
these  favored  daughters  of  the  West  should  come  to  share 
their  blessings  with  the  burdened  womanhood  of  the  East 
made  deep  impression.  In  thus  addressing  more  directly  the 
women  of  India  and  Ceylon,  the  missionaries  were  touching 
one  of  the  most  vulnerable  spots  both  in  the  religious  and 
social  life  of  these  lands. 

It  is  a  happy  and  most  Christian  fact  that  from  the  first 
missionary  work  in  India  tended  to  draw  together  the  different 


182  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN   BOARD 

bodies  of  native  workers  and  of  Christian  churches.  In  the 
days  of  weakness  and  peril,  when  the  missionaries  were  com- 
pelled   ''to  hang  together  lest  they  should   hang  separately," 

there  were  fine  examples  of  fellowship  and  comity, 
f  Ti  '^^     ^^^  ^^  there  were  on  a  larger  scale,  now  that  the 

several  missions  were  established  and  prospering. 
It  was  a  red-letter  day  for  the  church  of  Christ  in  India  when, 
in  1871,  150  representative  men  of  the  native  churches  of  the 
region  met  in  Bombay  and  formed  a  Christian  Alliance  to 
promote  their  common  interests  and  duties.  Again,  the  fol- 
lowing year,  the  American  Board  was  fully  represented  in  the 
great  missionary  conference  held  at  Allahabad,  where  came 
together  missionaries  from  twenty  different  societies  at  work 
in  various  parts  of  the  empire.  Here  all  met  without  distinc- 
tion; discussion  was  broad  and  generous;  at  the  communion 
service  brethren  sat  together  whose  denominations  were  in 
the  homeland  separated  by  fixed  barriers.  With  the  spirit 
of  comity  and  cooperation  thus  prevailing,  the  Board  could  bear 
more  patiently  the  occasional  irruptions  into  its  field  by  one 
or  two  societies,  whose  interpretation  of  their  mission  drove 
them  to  disregard  the  established  work  of  their  brethren  of 
other  bodies. 

The  advance  of  the  missions  in  this  period  was  marked  in 
one  way  by  the  opportunities  to  present  Christianity  to  the 
A  Widen-  educated  classes.  Opposition  even  of  the  fanatic 
ing  Influ-  sort  was  not  bygone.  So  late  as  1868,  in  the  Marathi 
ence  Mission,  when  two  Brahmans,  of  Sholapur,  became 

Christians,  a  mob  stormed  the  chapel  where  they  were,  beat 
some  native  Christians  until  the  blood  ran,  and  carried  off 
the  converts  as  captives.  But  it  was  not  uncommon  to  find 
educated  men  of  the  highest  caste  ready  to  show  courtesies 
and  to  give  attention  to  missionaries  as  they  spoke  on  themes 
of  Christianity.  At  the  same  time  preaching  to  the  masses 
of  the  people  was  continually  developed,  and  street  preaching 
was   pushed   with   new   earnestness,    notably   in   Satara   and 


IN  BRITISH   INDIA  AND  CEYLON  183 

Bombay.  The  latter  city  had  ever  been  a  hard  field  to  develop 
by  direct  missionary  work,  but  even  there  the  evangelistic 
work  was  now  pushed,  particularly  by  this  street  preaching. 
Audiences  were  made  up  chiefly  of  the  middle  classes;  often- 
times villagers  on  visits  to  the  city  would  stop  to  listen.  No 
controversy  or  tumult  was  allowed;  if  interruptions  came,  a 
hymn  was  sung  until  quiet  attention  was  restored. 

In  the  Madura  Mission  the  poUcy  prevailed  of  village  con- 
gregations as  distinct  from  churches.  In  many  places  there 
had  never  yet  been  a  baptism,  and  there  were  no  clear  and  con- 
sistent Christian  Hves;  only  a  group  of  weak  and  needy  people, 
willing  to  receive  instruction,  who  had  left  the  temple  worship 
and  desired  to  be  enrolled  as  adherents  of  the  Christian  relig- 
ion. By  1870  the  effect  of  this  policy  was  apparent;  all 
the  villages  of  the  Madura  Collectorate  were  open  to  the  gospel; 
during  that  year  1300  villages  were  visited,  and  70,000  people 
listened  to  the  Christian  message.  The  value  of  such  itiner- 
acies grew  on  the  missionaries;  some  of  them  produced  signifi- 
cant and  encouraging  results. 

So  the  period  closed  with  Christianity  displaying  its  power 
against  the  ancient  faiths  of  the  land.  Notwithstanding  the 
A  Famine  fact  that  few  temples  were  building  and  some  were 
and  a  faUing  into  decay,  their  revenues  declining  and  pil- 

Harvest  grimages  becoming  few,  Hinduism  was  by  no  means 
dead.  But  Christianity  was  tremendously  alive,  commanding 
increased  attention  and  winning  ever-widening  respect.  During 
the  years  1876-77  a  prolonged  drought  in  South  India  brought 
on  a  desperate  famine.  At  the  same  time  a  shortage  of  funds 
in  the  Board's  treasury  reduced  appropriations  and  added  to 
the  embarrassment  of  the  situation.  Notwithstanding  the 
increased  burden,  the  unconquerable  missionaries  essayed  the 
extra  task  of  famine  relief.  The  report  for  the  year  told  of 
special  evangelistic  efforts,  visits  to  heathen  homes,  and  the 
pushing  of  itineracies  by  missionaries  and  native  preachers, 
who  sought  to  take  advantage  of  the  new  approachableness  of 


184  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

the  hunger-stricken  masses.  Their  reward  came  the  following 
year  in  such  a  religious  awakening  as  the  several  missions  of 
southern  India  had  never  before  known.  It  was  estimated 
that  during  the  year  not  less  than  60,000  idolaters  cast  away 
their  idols  and  came  under  Christian  instruction.  While  in 
the  Madura  Mission  the  impetus  was  not  felt  so  much  as  in 
other  fields  farther  north,  yet  the  awakening  here  was  notable, 
bringing  not  only  numbers  to  the  churches,  but  increasing 
gifts  from  a  Christian  community  that  had  been  plunged  into 
stiU  deeper  poverty.  Although  there  came  some  reaction,  as 
often  after  such  times  of  revival,  the  ingathering  continued, 
and  the  period  closes,  for  this  mission  as  for  the  others  allied 
with  it,  in  gratitude  and  good  hope. 

A  comparison  of  the  situation  in  all  these  fields  at  the  begin- 
ning and  end  of  this  period  shows  strikingly  the  change  that 
had  been  wrought  in  the  emphasis  upon  the  development  of 
the  native  agency.  Putting  side  by  side  the  figures  of  1850 
and  1880,  it  appears  that  during  this  generation  there  was 
practically  no  increase  in  mission  stations,  but  a  leap  from 
eleven  to  291  in  the  number  of  outstations;  the  Madura  Mis- 
sion advancing  from  two  to  206,  and  the  Marathi  from  three 
to  seventy.  During  the  same  time  churches  increased  more 
than  three  fold.  Whereas  at  the  beginning  of  the  period 
there  were  but  twenty-three  churches  and  no  ordained  or 
settled  pastors,  and  less  than  sevent}^  native  helpers  of  all 
descriptions,  while  practically  nothing  was  being  given  by  the 
churches  and  native  Christians  toward  the  support  of  their 
institutions,  in  1880  there  were  seventy  organized  churches, 
thirty-eight  pastors,  155  native  preachers,  638  native  helpers 
of  all  descriptions,  and  native  contributions  amounting  to 
between  $5000  and  $6000.  In  all  the  missions  some  churches 
were  assuming  entire  support  of  their  pastors,  while  the  schools, 
especially  those  of  higher  grade,  were  deriving  fees  and  bene- 
factions from  the  people  they  were  founded  to  benefit.  Books 
and  papers  were  now  sold  rather  than  scattered  freely;  the 


IN  BRITISH  INDIA  AND   CEYLON  185 

general  condition  of  the  Christian  communities  as  to  homes, 
clothing,  and  general  prosperity  was  manifestly  improved. 
Christianity  had  become  estabhshed  at  the  end  of  the  period 
in  a  far  different  sense  from  what  it  was  at  the  beginning. 


Chapter  X 

IN  THE  LAND   OF  THE  DAKOTAS 

The  number  of  the  American  Board's  missions  among  the 
North  American  Indians  was  once  as  high  as  fifteen;  in  the 
Reduction  period  from  1850  to  1880  there  was  left  but  one 
of  Indian  vigorous  mission,  that  to  the  Dakotas.  The  dis- 
cissions continuance  or  transfer  of  these  missions,  begun  in 
1835,  went  steadily  on  in  the  new  period,  and  from  the  same 
causes.  In  1858  the  mission  to  the  Abenaquis  in  Canada  was 
suspended  because  of  the  dying  out  of  the  tribe;  in  1859 
work  among  the  Choctaws,  and  the  year  after  among  the 
Cherokees  and  Tuscaroras,  was  relinquished  on  the  ground  that 
these  tribes  were  so  far  civilized  and  Christianized  as  to  be  no 
longer  foreign  missionary  fields;  the  mission  to  the  Senecas  and 
the  difficult  and  dwindhng  effort  for  the  Ojibwas,  upon  the 
withdrawal  of  the  Presbyterians  from  the  Board,  in  1870, 
were  transferred  to  their  care. 

An  important  factor  in  the  decision  to  close  both  Chero- 
kee and  Choctaw  Missions  was  undoubtedly  the  increasing 
disturbance  of  the  slavery  issue;  the  embarrassment  occasioned 
by  the  attitude  of  the  missionaries  to  the  Indians  in  the  earlier 
years  was  now  increased  by  the  action  of  the  tribes  themselves. 
The  Choctaw  Council  in  1854  passed  a  law  forbidding  anyone 
to  teach  a  slave  or  the  children  of  a  slave  upon  pain  of  removal 
from  the  nation,  if  he  was  not  a  citizen;  similar  restrictions 
were  made  by  the  Cherokees.  If  these  drastic  laws  were  to 
be  enforced,  all  agreed  that  the  Board  could  not  continue  its 
work.  Efforts  were  made  to  proceed  quietly  in  hope  that  the 
situation  would  improve.     But  the  tension  did  not  relax;  the 

1S6 


IN  THE  LAND   OF  THE  DAKOTAS  187 

slavery  question  was  growing  more  divisive  and  urgent.  The 
missionaries  were  subjected  to  an  intolerable  espionage.  As 
there  were  now  in  proximity  to  these  Indian  communities 
other  denominations  with  whom  they  could  form  more  con- 
genial associations,  the  Board  felt  that  it  could  withdraw  from 
its  work  without  sacrificing  the  interests  involved. 

In  closing  these  missions  which  it  had  maintained  for  over 
forty  years,  the  Board  had  no  sense  of  failure.  The  expendi- 
ture had  been  large;  the  Cherokee  Mission  alone  had  cost 
$350,000,  and  113  missionaries,  men  and  women,  ministers, 
teachers  and  artisans,  had  put  their  lives  into  it.  But  the 
returns  had  been  large;  among  the  Choctaws  alone  2700  had 
confessed  Christ;  the  saving  influence  of  Christianity  upon 
the  life  of  that  tribe  no  statistics  could  express.  Not  all  had 
been  accomplished  that  had  been  hoped;  undeniably  some  of 
the  vices  of  civilization  had  been  adopted  along  with  its  arts 
and  refinements;  there  had  been  disappointing  lapses  and  mis- 
behaviors of  Indian  Christians.  The  progress  of  these  tribes 
had  been  somewhat  halting  and  inconstant;  yet,  on  the  whole, 
they  had  made  real  advance.  It  was  not  a  mournful  or  humili- 
ating duty,  therefore,  to  close  these  missions.  They  were  not 
abandoned;  the  Board's  work  was  done;  the  era  of  evangehzing 
was  past;  it  had  been  demonstrated  that  the  red  man,  rightly 
handled,  was  amenable  to  the  gospel,  and,  moreover,  that  the 
only  effectual  way  of  dealing  with  the  Indian  was  to  meet  him 
with  the  gospel;  and  not  in  word  only,  but  in  deed  and  truth. 

It  was  an  impressive  coincidence  that  the  closing  of  these 
missions  was  marked  by  the  passing  from  earth  of  that  devoted 
friend  and  untiring  servant  of  the  Cherokee  Mission,  Samuel 
Worcester,  who  died  in  the  mission  in  1859.  During  thirty- 
five  years  of  service,  beginning  at  Brainerd,  in  the  old  Cherokee 
nation,  he  had  endured,  out  of  love  for  this  people,  such  hard- 
ships, suffering,  and  reproach  as  no  pen  can  describe.  To 
the  privations  of  a  pioneer  in  the  wilderness  were  added  a 
cruel  and  unjust  imprisonment,  the  harassment  of  the  govern- 


188  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

merit's  shifty  course  with  the  Indians,  and  all  those  interrup- 
tions, delays,  and  obstacles  which  from  the  beginning  had 
attended  mission  work  among  the  aborigines.  The  service 
which  he  rendered  to  the  Cherokees  is  representative  of  what 
was  wrought  among  many  of  the  tribes  by  the  men  and  women 
who  went  to  them  as  missionaries  of  this  Board.  The  preaching 
of  his  voice  and  of  his  life,  the  Scriptures  and  the  tracts  he  pub- 
lished in  the  Cherokee  tongue,  the  long  influence  of  his  presence 
with  them,  his  body  laid  to  rest  beside  their  own  dead,  all 
were  to  abide  with  them  in  the  new  times  when  mission  and 
missionary  had  both  departed.  A  token  of  the  hold  these 
missionaries  had  on  their  people  appeared  when,  in  1873, 
fourteen  years  after  the  withdrawal.  Dr.  and  Mrs.  S.  L.  Hobbs, 
who  had  been  medical  missionaries  to  the  Choctaws,  upon 
repeated  request  were  sent  back  to  them  by  the  Board  to  help 
repair  the  damage  of  war  times. 

The  Board  had  left  then,  of  its  Indian  missions,  practically 
but  the  one  to  the  Sioux  or  Dakota  tribe.  Though  their 
The  territory  was  still  on  the  very  edge  of  the  frontier, 

Dakota  the  white  settler  was  already  approaching  with 
Field  greedy  eyes.     In  1851,  by  a  new  treaty,  all  of  what 

is  now  western  Minnesota  was  ceded  to  the  government,  and 
the  removal  of  the  Indians  was  ordered  to  the  Sioux  Reser- 
vation in  the  territory  of  Dakota.  The  peril  and  burden  of 
removal  confronted  the  mission  as  well  as  the  tribe.  Five  of 
its  six  stations  were  in  the  region  to  be  abandoned.  The  open- 
ing of  one  of  the  new  stations  at  Yellow  Medicine  in  the  autum*n 
of  1853  affords  a  ghmpse  of  the  labor  and  heroism  which  these 
transfers  entailed.  The  journey  of  Dr.  Williamson  and  the 
three  women  and  four  children  in  his  company  took  twelve 
days  by  boat  and  six  days  more  overland.  The  house 
supposed  to  be  ready  for  them  had  not  even  a  roof  on  it;  its 
interior  was  but  a  single  room,  without  stove  or  fireplace.  Yet 
this  was  their  home  during  a  winter  of  unusual  severity,  when 
a  supply-train  perished  in  the  snow.     For  six  weeks  the  house- 


IN  THE  LAND   OF  THE  DAKOTAS  189 

hold  lived  chiefly  on  potatoes  and  hominy.  But  the  missionary 
was  not  daunted.  "I  have  never  for  a  moment  regretted  our 
coming  here/'  he  wrote;  "I  never  felt  more  able  to  pray  for 
the  Dakotas,  or  greater  willingness  to  labor  and  suffer  for  the 
sake  of  extending  Christ's  kingdom."  When  the  spring  opened 
and  they  could  move  about  they  found  a  quicker  response 
than  among  the  Indians  left  behind.  Soon  a  congregation  of 
twenty,  including  the  chief,  attended  the  preaching  services; 
Miss  Williamson  had  forty  pupils  in  her  school.  The  trans- 
planted mission  throve  and  grew.  A  chapel  was  built  at  YeUow 
Medicine  without  cost  to  the  Board.  The  Lac-qui-parle  station 
was  transferred  to  Hazelwood,  where  in  1856  was  formed  the 
^'Hazelwood  Republic,"  a  community  governed  in  accordance 
with  a  written  constitution,  and  adopting  Christian  civiliza- 
tion; a  similar  community  developed  at  Redwood. 

The  work  of  reestablishment  was  thus  being  bravely  under- 
taken when  a  sudden  outbreak  upset  all  plans  and  for  a  time 
seemed  to  have  destroyed  the  mission.  The  storm 
W  ^862  ^^^  ^^^^  slowly  gathering.  Many  of  the  high- 
spirited  Sioux  cherished  a  deep  and  growing  hatred 
of  the  whites.  Cheated  by  traders,  driven  about  by  the 
government,  they  were  ready  to  be  played  upon  by  the  medi- 
cine men  and  the  young  braves  who  lusted  for  war.  The  spirit 
of  revolt  grew  silently.  A  warning  of  what  might  happen 
appeared  in  the  year  1857,  in  the  tragedy  of  Spirit  Lake,  when 
a  roving  band  of  famished  Indians  raided  a  settlement  and 
in  the  fight  that  ensued  killed  most  of  its  people.  The  one 
relieving  feature  of  the  tragedy  was  the  fact  that  two  of  the 
four  women  who  were  carried  off  were  recaptured  and  re- 
turned to  their  friends  by  Christian  Indians  associated  with 
the  mission. 

Five  years  later,  in  1862,  came  the  terrible  uprising  that 
brought  on  the  Sioux  war.  The  situation  at  the  time  was 
very  tense.  The  United  States  was  absorbed  in  the  Civil 
War;   Indian  affairs  were  of  necessity  neglected.     Annuities 


190  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

were  not  paid;  rations  were  delayed;  in  the  pinch  of  hunger 
thousands  of  Indians  crowded  into  the  agencies,  only  to  be 
put  off  once  more  with  rosy  promises,  and  to  be  advised  by 
scornful  traders  to  ''eat  dirt."  Meanwhile  stories  came  of 
disaster  to  the  Union  cause.  ''The  Great  Father  was  whipped." 
One  day  a  band  of  Sissitons  broke  into  the  storehouse  and 
began  to  help  themselves.  The  soldiers  turned  the  howitzer 
upon  them.  It  looked  like  war  then  and  there.  Only  by 
the  good  offices  of  Mr.  Riggs  was  a  fight  averted.  But  not 
for  long.  In  the  middle  of  August  trouble  broke  out  again, 
beginning  in  a  grog-shop  in  a  white  settlement.  The  next 
morning  the  uprising  was  general.  The  signal  was  passed  for 
a  general  massacre.  The  Christian  Indians  who  had  boldly 
opposed  the  outbreak  in  the  council  were  now  in  danger  of 
their  lives;  they  could  no  longer  protect  the  missionaries, 
whose  only  safety  was  instant  flight.  After  a  long,  perilous, 
and  exhausting  journey,  in  which  they  passed  burning  stacks 
and  houses  in  the  very  path  of  the  destroying  Sioux,  and  yet 
were  marvelously  delivered  from  the  hands  of  their  enemies, 
the  refugee  party  of  forty-four  at  last  escaped  to  St.  Paul. 

Once  started  on  war  the  Sioux  were  fiends  let  loose.  They 
swept  the  region  with  torch  and  tomahawk.  It  was  proper 
The  Church  ^^^^  ^^^  action  of  the  government  in  subduing  them 
in  Prison  should  be  stern  and  decisive.  Unhappily  the  leaders 
and  in  escaped,  and  in  the  trial  of  the  hundreds  of  prisoners 

Camp  ^Y^Q  were  taken  and  of  all  those  arrested  on  sus- 

picion, action  was  so  swift  and  violent  as  to  amount  to  a 
travesty  of  justice.  Even  sentences  of  death  were  so  sweep- 
ing that  President  Lincoln  felt  called  upon  to  revise  them. 
Four  hundred  manacled  Sioux  were  taken  to  temporary 
imprisonment  at  Mankato,  where  thirty-eight  were  executed. 
The  women  and  children,  with  the  men  relieved  of  suspicion, 
about  1500  in  all,  were  sent  down  to  Fort  Snelling  (St.  Paul) 
to  a  winter  camp.  It  was  when  the  outlook  for  the  mission 
seemed  darkest  that  the  mercy  of  God  appeared  in  a  great  and 


IN   THE  LAND   OF  THE  DAKOTAS  191 

genuine  religious  awakening.  It  showed  itself  first  among  the 
prisoners  at  Mankato,  but  Dr.  Riggs,  upon  going  to  his  family 
at  Fort 'Snelling,  found  signs  of  it  there.  Humbled,  disheart- 
ened, in  the  day  of  tribulation  the  proud  Sioux  were  ready  to 
listen  to  the  gospel  of  Christ.  Both  prison  and  camp  became 
schools  of  Christian  instruction.  Those  who  could  read  taught 
the  others.  A  Christian  elder  of  the  Yellow  Medicine  Church, 
imprisoned  on  suspicion,  was  able  to  serve  as  an  evangelist 
to  his  fellow  prisoners.  Some  of  the  missionaries  added  their 
help.  In  the  spring,  as  a  result  of  that  memorable  revival, 
over  200  Dakotas  were  baptized  and  added  to  the  church  in 
one  day.  A  similar  result  came  at  Fort  Snelling.  The  harvest 
of  that  winter  was  an  amazement  and  joy  to  the  worn  mis- 
sionaries. 

As  the  prisoners  were  removed  from  Mankato  to  Daven- 
port, Iowa,  in  the  spring  of  1863,  they  went  in  chains  to  be 
sure,  but  freemen  in  Christ  Jesus.  As  their  boat  went  down 
the  river  they  could  be  heard  singing  the  Fifty-first  Psalm  to 
the  tune  of  Old  Hundred.  At  this  time  the  winter  camp  at 
Fort  Snelling  was  broken  and  1300  Dakotas,  together  with 
1800  Winnebagoes,  were  transferred  to  a  place  called  Crow 
Creek  on  the  upper  Missouri.  The  story  of  their  life  there, 
far  from  their  old  home,  in  sickness  and  fearful  mortality, 
during  three  dry  and  pinched  years,  while  waiting  for  the  men 
to  be  released  from  the  Davenport  prison,  and  for  permission 
to  settle  in  northeastern  Nebraska,  somewhat  nearer  their  old 
land,  is  one  of  the  pitiful  chapters  in  Indian  history.  Yet, 
during  all  this  period  of  rather  idle  and  unsettled  life,  neither 
company  abandoned  the  religion  which  they  had  accepted. 
On  the  Sunday  before  they  were  released  the  prisoners  cele- 
brated the  communion  for  the  last  time  as  a  church  in  prison. 
And  when  the  reunion  came,  this  strange  church  of  more  than 
500  members,  ex-prisoners  and  their  families,  was  set  up  in 
the  new  home  as  the  ''Pilgrim  Church,"  so  called  from  the 
vicissitudes  of  its  history. 


192  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

Normal  conditions  being  resumed  by  the  location  of  the 
Dakotas  at  their  new  home,  it  came  to  be  seen  what  a 
The  Re-  change  had  been  wrought,  and  that  the  seeming 
established  defeat  had  been  really  a  rebirth  of  the  mission. 
Mission  Native  leaders  and  helpers  now  appeared.  Lives 
sternly  disciplined  were  able  to  bear  responsibility.  There 
were  promising  youth  to  be  trained,  and  a  Christian  civiliza- 
tion to  be  developed.  Soon  new  locations  were  occupied, 
more  stations  and  outstations  begun,  churches  formed  with 
native  pastors,  and  schools  established.  In  1867  a  "select 
school"  was  opened  by  Messrs.  Pond  and  Williamson  at  Santee 
Agency,  which  grew  at  length  into  the  Normal  Training  School, 
under  Rev.  A.  L.  Riggs,  and  became  the  center  of  the  Board's 
educational  work  for  the  Indians. 

The  Santee  and  Sissiton  agencies  now  grew  to  be  established 
and  measurably  self-reliant  Christian  communities.  Govern- 
ment schools  reduced  somewhat  the  field  of  mission  schools. 
New  stations  were  opened,  in  1872,  to  the  north  at  Fort  Sully, 
among  a  branch  of  the  tribe  as  yet  unreached,  and  in  1876 
at  Fort  Berthold,  still  farther  north,  among  Mandans  and 
other  tribes  much  more  degraded  than  the  Sioux.  In  1882  a 
committee  of  the  Board,  visiting  this  latter  station  with  other 
Indian  missions,  saw  here  the  primitive  oval  lodges  of  earth 
with  grass  growing  on  them,  and  with  poles  above  bearing 
buffalo  skulls  and  charms  against  evil.  Over  the  medicine 
lodge  a  Sioux  scalp  dangled.  Amid  great  discouragement  Rev. 
Charles  L.  Hall  undertook  the  work  in  this  difficult  but  des- 
perately needy  field,  as  heathen  as  any  community  under  the 
sun. 

The  lot  of  the  Indians  in  those  days  was  not  fortunate  for 
the  growth  of  Christian  character.  Held  as  dependents  of  the 
government,  existing  in  part  on  its  bounty,  tethered  on  reserva- 
tions, subject  to  the  orders  of  shifting  agents,  and  often  ill- 
used  by  unscrupulous  white  men,  they  were  constantly  tempted 
or  discouraged  into  misbehavior.     Many  of  the  Indian  agents 


IN  THE  LAND  OF  THE  DAKOTAS  193 

were  helpful  and  sympathetic  to  the  missionaries.  In  1872 
the  missionary  societies  were  even  permitted  to  name  certain 
agents.  The  government  sincerely  tried  to  correct  the  abuses 
of  the  agency  system.  Yet  many  things  happened  that  were 
disheartening  and  injurious.  At  the  same  time  clear  gains 
were  made.  Secretary  Treat,  visiting  Santee  in  1872,  was 
delighted  with  what  he  found;  the  Indians  had  just  received 
certificates  of  title  to  their  land,  and  it  was  good  to  see  them 
occupying  it  like  other  settlers.  The  church,  notwithstanding 
many  removals,  had  225  members,  a  worthy  pastor,  and  well- 
appearing,  intelligent  officers.  Ten  years  had  certainly  wrought 
a  transformation  among  the  Sioux. 

At  length  these  Indian  churches  came  into  fellowship  with 
their  white  brethren  of  the  home  mission  churches.  The 
Congregational  Association  of  Dakota  territory 
p  ..  , .  met  at  the  Santee  agency  in  1873.  When  the  same 
year  the  American  Board  held  its  annual  meeting 
for  the  first  time  in  the  Northwest,  at  Minneapohs,  it  was  on 
foreign  missionary  ground  of  thirty  years  before.  One  of  the 
impressive  features  of  the  occasion  was  the  attendance  of 
seventeen  Dakotas  and  four  Ojibwas  with  their  missionaries; 
their  presence  gave  point  and  power  to  the  appeals  of  Governor 
Buckingham  and  Generals  Whittlesey  and  Howard  for  more 
vigorous  work  for  the  Indians. 

Another  conflict  between  the  Dakotas  and  the  United  States 
authorities,  in  1876,  did  not  directly  touch  the  missions  or  the 
More  communities   they   were   reaching.     But  it   stirred 

Indian  anew  the  question  as  to  the  final  disposition  of  the 

Experi-  Dakotas  and  raised  new  apprehensions  concerning 
ments  ^j^^  mission  work. 

At  this  time  the  desire  of  the  government  and  people  of 
the  United  States  to  find  a  better  way  of  dealing  with  the 
Indians,  stimulated  as  it  was  by  the  activities  of  the  Indian 
Rights  Association  and  kindred  organizations,  led  to  the  form- 
ing of  certain  colonies  like  the  Flandreau,  on  the  eastern  border 


194  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

of  Dakota,  made  up  from  Santee  in  1877,  whose  members  left 
their  tribal  relations  to  settle  on  United  States  land.  Receiv- 
ing 160-acre  homesteads  and  protected  with  all  rights  of  citizen- 
ship, they  began  to  farm  and  carry  on  other  pursuits,  to  build 
their  churches  and  schools,  and  to  live  precisely  hke  white 
settlers.  The  immediate  success  of  this  advance  movement 
gave  courage  to  the  missionaries  in  their  task  of  preparing 
leaders  for  the  new  era  and  urging  homestead  rights  for  the 
Indian. 

The  organization  of  a  native  missionary  society  in  1877, 
with  the  commissioning  of  Rev.  David  Greycloud  to  break  new 
The  ground  at  Standing  Rock  Agency,  was  a  sign  of  a 

Maturing  growth  in  the  Dakota  churches.  Another  mile-stone 
Work  in   the   history  was   the   appearance   of  the   entire 

Bible  in  the  Dakota  language  in  1879.  A  few  days  afterward 
the  veteran  Dr.  WiUiamson,  who  had  a  large  part  in  the  trans- 
lation of  the  Old  Testament,  having  closed  the  crowning  labor 
of  his  devoted  and  arduous  career,  fell  on  sleep.  He  had  seen 
the  transformation  of  savage  hordes  into  Christian  communities, 
and  he  had  been  privileged  to  have  an  eminent  part  in  the 
accomplishment  of  this  change. 

After  a  careful  investigation  of  the  Indian  fields,  in  1882,  by 
a  deputation  consisting  of  Dr.  A.  C.  Thompson,  C.  C.  Burr, 
Esq.,  and  Secretary  John  O.  Means,  they  presented  an  exceed- 
ingly full  and  informing  report  to  the  annual  meeting  of  that 
year.  Each  of  the  fields  was  described  at  length  as  to  its 
history,  condition,  and  outlook,  the  conclusion  being  reached 
that  the  era  of  foreign  missions  in  Santee  and  Sissiton  was 
passed,  while  at  Fort  Berthold  and  Devil  Lake  and  Standing 
Rock,  where  the  Indians  were  still  for  the  most  part  in  pagan 
degradation,  the  work  should  be  pressed  with  greater  vigor. 
An  especial  opportunity  appeared  at  the  agencies  along  the 
Missouri  River  through  the  surrender  of  Sitting  Bull  and  his 
hostiles;  it  seemed  that  once  more  the  plowshare  of  war  had 
broken  the  ground  for  the  gospel's  harvest.     It  was  therefore 


IN   THE  LAND   OF  THE   DAKOTAS  195 

recommended  by  the  deputation  that  if  the  work  at  the  older 
stations  could  be  transferred  efforts  should  be  concentrated 
on  the  others.  While  the  Prudential  Committee  was  thus 
considering  the  suggestion  of  transfer,  it  received  a  proposal 
from  the  American  Missionary  Association  to  take  over  the 
work  of  the  entire  Dakota  Mission  on  terms  that  might  be 
mutually  agreeable,  and  with  the  thought  that  the  Association 
should  thenceforth  limit  itself  to  work  in  the  homeland.  After 
deliberation  and  conference  the  Board  accepted  this  proposal, 
and  on  January  1,  1883,  the  transfer  was  made.  From  that 
time  on  the  story  of  this  mission  to  the  Dakotas,  of  its  main- 
tenance, enlargement,  and  signal  achievements,  is  part  of  the 
history  of  this  honored  sister  society. 


Chapter  XI 

IN  TURKEY  AND  THE  LEVANT 

The  firman  of  1850,  which  put  evangehcal  Christians  on  a 
footing  with  other  Christian  communities  in  the  empire,  was 
The  hailed  as  a  charter  of   religious  Hberty.      It  soon 

Changed  appeared  that  not  all  was  gained  that  had  been 
Situation  hoped.  The  sultan  held  the  execution  of  the  decree 
in  his  own  hand,  and  he  was  in  no  hurry  to  act.  However, 
circumstances  soon  compelled  him  to  enforce  it  and  even  to 
make  larger  admissions.  Another  imperial  finnan  in  1853 
required  of  all  governors  and  other  authorities  that  the  charter 
of  1850  be  straitly  enforced.  The  outbreak  of  the  Crimean 
War  the  next  year  occasioned  especial  alarm  to  the  mission- 
aries. But  their  fears  were  happily  dispelled,  for,  aside  from 
the  distraction  of  thought  and  some  disorder  among  the  more 
lawless  races,  this  war  scarcely  interfered  with  the  Board's 
undertaking.  No  missionary  was  driven  from  his  post;  no 
mission  establishment  was  injured.  Indeed,  the  event  was 
to  their  advantage,  as  there  was  forced  from  the  sultan  in 
1856  the  famous  Hatti  Humayoun,  a  firman  granting  full 
freedom  of  conscience  and  religious  profession  to  all  his  sub- 
jects. Religious  liberty  was  now  secured,  at  least  by  decree;  if 
it  was  not  fully  granted  in  fact  for  long  years,  the  principle 
was  admitted;  patience  and  skilful  persistence  could  secure  its 
operation. 

The  changed  attitude  of  the  government  toward  the  work 
of  the  missionaries  was  not  so  remarkable  as  was  that  of  the 
people.     In  1830  Smith  and  Dwight  did  not  find  one  evan- 

196 


IN  TURKEY  AND  THE  LEVANT      197 

gelical  Christian  in  all  their  travels  over  the  empire;  in  1850 
there  were  known  to  be  ''Protestants"  in  at  least  fifty  centers 
Armenia  in  Asiatic  Turkey,  and  in  such  number  that  ten 
Wide  churches   were    already   organized,    some    of   them 

Open  having  native  pastors.     The  Armenian  reformation, 

like  an  irresistible  tide,  was  carrying  evangelical  Christianity 
to  every  corner  of  the  land.  Mr.  A.  H.  Layard  declared  in 
the  British  Parliament,  in  1853,  that  there  was  no  considerable 
place  in  all  Turkey  where  the  influence  of  this  reformation  was 
not  felt.  The  President  of  the  Armenian  National  Council 
said  to  Mr.  D wight:  ''Now  is  the  time  for  you  to  work  for 
the  Armenian  people.  Such  an  opportunity  as  you  now  enjoy 
may  soon  pass  away  and  never  more  return.  You  should 
greatly  enlarge  your  operations.  Where  you  have  one  mis- 
sionary, you  should  have  ten;  and  where  you  have  one  book, 
you  should  put  ten  books  in  circulation." 

The  missionaries,  working  at  full  speed,  were  unable  to  meet 
the  calls.  They  dreaded  the  coming  of  the  mail  because  of 
their  inability  to  meet  the  importunities  of  waiting  cities  and 
districts.  The  Board  felt  the  challenge  of  this  urgent  oppor- 
tunity in  a  field  peculiarly  committed  to  its  care  and  instructed 
the  Prudential  Committee  to  prosecute  the  Armenian  Mission 
to  the  utmost.  But  with  much  help  or  with  little,  the  reforma- 
tion went  on.  The  story  of  its  progress  in  some  of  the  new 
and  influential  centers  almost  staggers  belief.  Aintab,  scarcely 
known  by  name  in  1845,  had  ten  years  later  a  church  of  141 
members;  there  were  more  Protestants  there  than  in  Con- 
stantinople. The  men  who  laid  the  foundations,  like  Dr. 
Azariah  Smith  and  Rev.  Benjamin  Schneider,  were  master 
workmen.  And  Aintab  had  not  only  numbers  but  life.  Native 
evangelists,  driven  from  place  to  place,  carried  the  gospel  to 
the  villages  of  the  district  with  irrepressible  zeal.  Men  of 
Aintab  went  forth  to  other  towns  to  work  at  their  trades  and 
to  preach  Christ;  they  could  not  be  treated  as  vagrants  and 
everywhere  they  won  a  hearing.     The  first  building  for  worship 


198  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

erected  by  Protestant  Christians  in  the  Ottoman  empire  was 
the  great  structure  of  stone,  accommodating  more  than  2000 
people,  now  the  First  Church  at  Aintab. 

The  coming  of  the  reformation  to  Marsovan  and  its  course 
there  were  typical.  One  of  its  citizens  in  1833  bought  in 
Beirut  a  few  tracts,  and  read  them,  not  knowing  what  they 
were.  Years  afterward,  meeting  a  missionary  on  tour,  he 
recognized  the  similarity  of  teaching.  Not  daring  to  speak 
out  before  the  Vartabed,  he  sought  the  missionary  and  they 
prayed  together.  When  Mr.  Powers  visited  Marsovan,  in 
1851,  he  met  the  man  and  found  that  the  way  had  been  opened 
for  a  general  welcome.  Soon  this  first  inquirer  was  taken  from 
his  bed  at  midnight  and  sent  to  a  vile  prison;  upon  his  release 
he  stimulated  further  inquiry  as  to  the  new  teaching.  Another 
visit  from  a  missionary  was  followed  by  a  general  awakening, 
which  persecution  only  increased.  A  copy  of  the  sultan's 
firman  of  1850  at  last  reached  the  city  and  brought  protection 
to  the  evangelical  community. 

The  missionaries  did  what  they  could  to  meet  the  immense 
demand  of  the  situation,  but  were  at  their  wits'  end  to  pro- 
Laborers  vide  for  the  waiting  fields.  Contrary  to  hope,  the 
for  the  great  revival  of  1857  in  the  United  States  did  not 
Harvest  increase  the  supply  of  missionaries.  The  closing 
of  an  attempted  mission  to  the  Jews  in  European  Turkey  set 
free  a  few  workers  to  reenforce  the  Armenian  Mission. 

This  work  for  Jews,  begun  at  Salonica,  in  1849,  by  Revs. 
E.  M.  Dodd  and  Justin  Parsons,  had  met  with  disappointing 
response.  Impressions  were  gained  concerning  Bulgaria  and 
Macedonia  that  were  to  bear  fruit  later  in  a  rewarding  work  in 
those  regions.  But  the  missionaries  found  the  Jews  imper- 
vious to  their  message.  Feeling  that  they  were  still  the  beloved 
of  Heaven,  and  that  their  tithings  constituted  holiness,  these 
people  were  punctilious  in  their  forms  of  religion  while  really 
worshiping  gold.  The  station  at  Salonica  proved  very  un- 
healthy; English  and  Scotch  societies  seemed  ready  and  better 


IN   TURKEY  AND  THE   LEVANT  199 

able  to  work  the  field,  and  in  1856  it  was  decided  to  with- 
draw the  missionaries  to  meet  the  importunate  need  of  the 
Armenians. 

In  this  emergency  the  demand  for  native  workers  and  leaders 
increased.  Native  students  were  hurried  into  the  ministry, 
and  still  opportunities  were  being  lost  for  lack  of  men.  New 
schools  for  training ,  native  helpers  were  urged.  Bebek  Sem- 
inary became  of  growing  importamce.  The  Crimean  War 
brought  new  fame  to  it  and  to  Dr.  Hamlin,  its  principal.  By 
making  bread  for  the  soldiers  in  the  military  hospital  at  Scutari, 
and  setting  up  a  laundry  to  wash  their  clothes.  Dr.  Hamlin 
won  the  regard  and  confidence  not  only  of  military  officials, 
but  of  the  people  to  whom  his  energy  and  ingenuity  thus 
opened  new  means  of  livehhood.  Over  $25,000  was  cleared 
from  the  industries  brolight  into  existence  by  the  Crimean 
War  and  conducted  by  Dr.  Hamlin,  who  made  of  this  sum  a 
building  fund,  with  which  thirteen  churches  were  erected  to 
aid  in  the  Armenian  reformation.  By  the  close  of  the  war 
the  seminary  was  rendering  notable  help  in  the  training  of 
native  leaders.  Though  located  at  Constantinople,  many  of 
its  students  came  from  the  far  interior,  and  graduates  were 
scattered  as  widely.  Its  more  than  100  students  were  ad- 
dressed in  three  languages,  Armenian,  Greek,  and  English. 
Two  young  men  who  came  in  1852  from  Diarbekir  in  the  face 
of  tremendous  difficulties  to  gain  an  education  at  Constanti- 
nople were  a  few  years  later  to  be  found,  one  as  pastor  of  the 
young  church  at  Harpoot,  the  other  filling  the  same  office  at 
Diarbekir.  A  sweeping  revival  in  the  seminary  in  1859  won 
to  Christ  almost  every  student  hitherto  but  nominally  Chris- 
tian. 

The  work  of  native  agents  thus  pushed  to  the  front  was 
highly  gratifying;  it  overcame  the  misgivings  of  missionaries 
as  to  trusting  them  with  so  large  responsibilities,  and  often- 
times made  a  powerful  impression  upon  the  communities  they 
served. 


200  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

The  evangelization  of  the  Armenians  was  now  progressing 
by  leaps.  Tocat  and  Cesarea  were  occupied  in  1854;  in  1857 
Xhe  Mr.    Dunmore   wrote   that   forty   more   men   were 

Enlarging  needed  as  teachers  and  preachers  in  that  region. 
Field  By  1860,  houses  of  worship  were  secured  at  Marash, 

Kessab,  and  Killis.  The  people  of  the  last-named  place  bore 
all  the  expense,  turning  out  at  night  to  dig  the  foundations  by 
torchlight. 

The  rapid  expansion  soon  required  a  division  of  the  field. 
After  separation  into  northern  and  southern  Armenia  in  1857, 
in  1860,  at  the  annual  meeting  of  the  northern  section  in  Har- 
poot,  a  further  and  threefold  division  into  Eastern,  Western, 
and  Central  Turkey  was  effected,  which  continues  to  this  day. 
How  rapid  had  been  the  growth  in  these  years  appears  in  the 
fact  that  at  Harpoot  where  this  meeting  was  held,  and  where 
there  was  then  a  church  of  thirty-six  members,  five  years 
before  there  was  not  one  acknowledged  evangelical  Christian. 

Thus  by  1861  the  field  of  the  Board's  missions  in  Asiatic 
Turkey  was  extended  practically  to  its  present  boundaries, 
and  the  gospel  was  being  openly  preached  from  one  end  of  it 
to  the  other.  Churches  and  schools  were  established  and 
even  higher  education  begun.  Everything  seemed  ready  for 
a  quick  advance;  it  looked  as  though  the  field  could  be  carried 
by  storm.  It  was  not  strange,  perhaps,  that  the  missionaries 
in  1860  began  to  anticipate  the  time  when  in  that  portion  of 
Turkey  no  increase  of  missionaries  would  be  needed;  the  native 
church  would  be  able  to  maintain  the  growing  work. 

And  it  was  not  only  among  the  Armenians  that  missionary 
effort  was  undertaken.  After  the  Crimean  War,  it  was  possible 
to  remove  the  mission's  book  depository  from  Pera  across  the 
Golden  Horn  into  Stamboul,  whereupon  began  a  new  era  for 
publication.  The  Avedaper,  a  religious  bi-monthly,  was  then 
started  under  the  editorial  care  of  Dr.  Dwight,  destined  to 
become  a  permanent  institution  and  in  its  different  editions 
for  various  races  to  have  wide  influence  all  over  the  empire. 


IN  TURKEY  AND  THE  LEVANT      201 

Publications  were  not  only  increased,  but  now  were  more  and 
more  circulated  among  the  Mohammedans,  toward  whom 
the  eyes  of  the  mission  turned  with  new  expectancy.  Direct 
work  for  them  was  quietly  begun  in  1856,  Dr.  Goodell  having 
shrewdly  concluded  that  the  Turks  were  more  anxious  to 
prevent  a  demonstration  than  a  conversion.  Hundreds  of 
copies  of  the  Scriptures  were  sold  yearly  to  Turks,  and  by 
1860  results  were  appearing.^ 

While  the  Armenian  Mission  was  full  of  enthusiasm  and 
growing  life,  Rev.  Jonas  King  was  maintaining  his  lonely  and, 
Jonas  as  it  often  seemed,  unavailing  mission  in  Greece. 

King  in  His  career  continued  to  the  end  one  long  conflict 
Greece  -^jth  the  Greek  hierarchy.  Year  after  year  told 
the  same  story,  a  succession  of  charges,  arrests,  trials,  impris- 
onments, and  releases.  And  always  Dr.  King  was  pushing 
his  work  just  as  far  and  as  fast  as  he  dared,  pausing  and  even 
withdrawing  temporarily  when  he  must.  It  seemed  in  the 
hour  of  utmost  need  there  was  ever  some  relief.  Officials 
would  listen  to  his  appeal,  and  suffer  him  when  sick  in  prison 
to  be  removed  to  his  own  house  under  guard.  Daniel  Webster, 
as  Secretary  of  State,  Edward  Everett,  his  successor,  or  Min- 
ister George  P.  Marsh,  by  direction  of  the  President  of  the 
United  States,  would  utter  strong  protests  to  the  government 
of  Greece  when  the  missionary  was  subjected  to  unfair  and 
oppressive  trial.  At  length,  after  a  particularly  outrageous 
decision  of  the  court  against  Mr.  King,  pubHc  sentiment  turned 
strongly  in  his  favor;  congregations  increased,  and  the  reward 
of  patience  seemed  to  have  come  when  the  first  theological 
class  of  six  young  Greeks  and  one  Italian  were  preparing  for 
the  ministry  under  Dr.  King's  instruction.  But  in  a  few  years 
there  was  another  arrest  and  a  dragging  trial. 

The  eventful  year,  1863,  brought  the  election  of  a  national 
assembly  and  the  enthronement  of  the  Protestant  King 
George.     One  of  the  earliest  acts  of  the  new  ruler  was  to  send 

'  The  narrative  of  this  mission  is  resumed  on  page  215. 


202  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

for  Dr.  King  to  administer  the  Lord's  Supper  to  him  in  his 
palace  chapel.  It  surely  looked  as  though  smoother  times 
were  in  store  for  this  mission.  Though  during  that  very  year 
one  of  Dr.  King's  books  was  anathematized,  he  now  felt  that 
he  was  fighting  his  last  missionary  battle.  Some  promising 
evangelical  leaders  were  appearing,  like  Messrs.  Kalopathakes 
and  Constantine,  so  that  the  missionary's  energies  during  his 
closing  years  could  be  devoted  to  assisting  them.  At  eventide 
it  was  light  for  this  man  whose  day  of  toil  had  been  storm- 
swept.  At  last  Dr.  King  was  able  to  call  on  the  metropolitan 
bishop,  who  now  received  him  with  all  courtesy  and  friend- 
liness. In  1869  was  summoned  from  earth  this  heroic,  astute, 
and  unconquerable  pioneer  of  the  American  Board's  missions 
in  the  Levant. 

The  turbulent  period  in  the  history  of  the  Syrian  Mission 
was  not  over  in  1850.     The  combination  of  Turkey's  unstable 
politics  and  the  racial  and  religious  animosities  of 
g    .  the  peoples  crowded  together  in  this  remote  prov- 

ince did  not  favor  orderly  mission  work.  Lawless 
chiefs  were  continually  provoking  raids  in  the  mountains,  so 
that  it  was  unsafe  to  venture  outside  the  established  centers. 
An  outbreak  of  Turkish  violence  at  Aleppo,  in  1850,  for  a 
time  broke  up  all  intercourse  between  the  missionaries  and  the 
jealous  sects  of  oriental  Christians.  Evangelical  communities 
were  often  left  exposed  to  the  malice  of  their  enemies,  and 
with  disastrous  effect.  At  Hasbeiya,  when  the  villagers  came 
in  to  a  communion  service,  they  were  fully  armed,  and  stacked 
their  guns  and  hung  up  their  swords  in  the  court  before  enter- 
ing the  chapel. 

And  the  difficulties  were  not  all  in  fear  of  physical  violence. 
There  was  a  dogged  unresponsiveness  in  the  mass  of  the  people 
hard  to  combat,  one  reason  for  which  seemed  to  be  the  ingrained 
religiosity  of  the  Syrians;  the  most  evil-minded  and  vicious 
were  satisfied  with  their  own  piety,  so  saturated  were  their 
customs  and  language  with  the  forms  of  devotion. 


IN   TURKEY   AND   THE   LEVANT  203 

In  spite  of  such  difficulties,  the  work  went  on  through  the 
faith  and  devotion  of  undaunted  souls.     Individuals  were  won; 

groups  of  disciples  organized;  boys  and  girls  of 
^  .  promise  were  patiently  taught.     Simeon  Calhoun, 

now  in  charge  of  the  school  at  Abeih  which  Dr. 
Van  Dyck  had  opened,  was  the  ''Saint  of  Mount  Lebanon,"  on 
whose  words  Druze  sheiks  hung  enthralled.  From  his  teaching 
and  mighty  personal  influence  was  beginning  to  come  a  stream 
of  teachers  and  preachers  to  bless  the  region.  And  this  modest 
seminary  was  the  forerunner  and  inspirer  of  higher  schools  soon 
to  follow.  The  word  of  the  gospel  was  also  being  distributed 
far  and  wide.  In  1860  appeared  the  Arabic  version  of  the 
New  Testament,  wherein  Dr.  Van  Dyck  had  completed  the 
work  of  Dr.  Eli  Smith.  At  once  it  took  precedence  over  all 
others,  and  went  forth  to  win  the  admiring  attention  of  all 
Arabic-speaking  people  throughout  Syria,  and  even  beyond, 
in  Arabia  itself,  and  in  Egypt.  In  the  same  year  Dr.  William 
Thomson  brought  out  his  famous  work.  The  Land  and  the 
Book,  which  quickened  interest  not  only  in  the  Bible,  but 
in  the  peoples  for  whom  its  author  had  labored. 

By  such  aids  and  methods  Protestant  communities  were 
slowly  built  up.  A  glimpse  which  one  missionary  gives  of  a 
church  service  in  a  little  village  near  Sidon  shows  in  what 
small  and  simple  habitations  the  living  Church  of  Christ  can 
abide  and  grow.  ''The  room,"  he  says,  "was  divided,  by  a 
slight  difference  in  the  height  of  the  floor,  into  two  parts;  in 
one  of  which  were  quartered  cattle  of  various  sizes  and  descrip- 
tions, feeding  and  reclining,  and  in  the  other  we  worshiped. 
The  audience  was  seated  upon  the  floor,  round  a  blazing  fire; 
and  as  there  was  no  place  but  the  door  for  the  entrance  of 
the  light,  so  there  was  no  way  for  the  exit  of  the  smoke  but 
through  the  same  convenient  opening.  And  yet  I  doubt  if 
there  assembled  that  day,  in  any  courtly  church  at  home, 
more  eager  listeners  than  gathered  there,  or  those  offering  more 
acceptable  prayer  than  xheir  hearts  presented." 


204  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

It  was  when  conditions  of  missionary  work  were  tlius  slowly 
brightening  that  the  sky  suddenly  turned  black  as  night. 
Syria's  Maronites  and  Druzes  in  the  mountains  were  at 
Civil  War,  each  others'  throats  again;  murders  and  massacres 
i860  were    daily    occurrences.     Fire    and    sword    swept 

everything  in  their  path.  European  nations  soon  became 
involved  as  they  championed  the  cause  of  one  or  other  of 
the  combatants.  Neighboring  races  were  involved,  as  Kurds 
and  Bedouins.  The  land  was  wrung  with  the  madness  and 
horror  of  the  time.  Christians  of  various  sects  were  slaugh- 
tered by  the  thousand,  even  at  such  centers  as  Damascus  and 
Baalbec.  No  missionary  suffered  any  personal  injury,  and 
only  a  few  Protestants  at  Hasbeiya,  but  now  a  stream  of  human 
want  and  misery  began  to  flow  into  Beirut  to  overwhelm  the 
sympathies  of  the  mission  workers.  Over  50,000  souls  hung 
upon  charity  for  food  and  shelter.  When  the  outburst  of 
ancient  feuds  had  spent  its  fury,  all  parties  began  again  to 
persecute  the  Protestants;  they  were  reviled,  driven  from 
business,  stoned,  imprisoned,  threatened,  tortured.  Some 
yielded  to  their  tormentors,  but  many  endured. 

Slowly  order  was  restored,  and  more  peaceful  times  ensued. 
Syria  at  last  began  to  feel  the  impress  of  European  civiliza- 
tion, and  to  covet  some  of  the  prosperity  and  progress 
!p  ®  that  were  found  in  happier  lands.     By   1863  the 

missionaries  could  report  a  more  peaceful  year  on 
the  Lebanon.  Even  Hasbeiya  ventured  to  rebuild  its  church, 
burned  in  the  holocaust  of  1860.  But  the  scattered  flock 
returned  slowly.  A  widow  in  1868  excused  her  absence  from 
evening  service  because  the  houses  about  her  were  all  in  ruins 
and  the  hyenas  prowled  at  night! 

Better  days,  however,  were  dawning.  Looking  back  over  a 
decade  it  could  be  seen  that  much  progress  had  been  made. 
The  mission  had  won  a  standing  both  with  authorities  and 
people;  converts  were  stronger  and  the  mission's  equipment 
greatly  improved.    In  particular,  the  Syrian  Protestant  College 


IN  TURKEY  AND  THE  LEVANT      205 

at  Beirut  was  opened  in  1864,  with  Dr.  Daniel  Bliss  as 
president,  substantial  friends  in  America,  and  a  purpose  to 
meet  the  call  of  the  new  times.  Year  by  year  henceforth  it  was 
to  contribute  its  strain  of  strong,  rich  life,  not  only  to  the  land 
of  Syria,  but  far  and  wide,  through  Turkey,  Egypt,  and  the 
entire  Levant.  Five  years  later  a  theological  seminary  was 
founded  at  Abeih,  with  Messrs.  Calhoun,  Eddy,  and  Jessup 
as  its  instructors.  It  was  as  the  Syrian  Mission  was  thus 
entering  upon  a  new  period  in  its  life,  with  fairer  prospects 
than  ever  before,  and  with  the  long,  patient  labor  of  years 
somewhat  justified  and  rewarded,  that  in  the  transfers  of 
1870  this  mission,  with  others,  was  taken  over  by  the  Pres- 
byterians, with  whom  it  had  peculiarly  close  ties  of  relation. 
Its  after-history  thus  belongs  to  the  annals  of  the  Board  of 
Foreign  Missions  of  the  Presbjrterian  Church  in  the  United 
States. 

Like  the  Syrian  Mission,  the  one  to  the  Nestorians  was 
destined  to  be  transferred  to  the  Presbyterians  in  the  re- 
The  arrangements  of  1870.      For  it,  also,  the  history  of 

Nestorian  this  time  covers  a  stormy  and  burdened  period.  The 
Mission  announcement  in  1851  of  an  edict  of  toleration, 
promising  equal  protection  to  all  the  Christian  subjects  of 
Persia,  and  the  liberty  to  change  their  religion  at  will,  was  at 
once  followed  by  new  and  disturbing  interferences.  The 
Roman  Catholics  became  more  hostile,  Persian  officials  more 
arrogant  and  oppressive.  Mr.  Cochran  was  seized  and  robbed 
by  a  Kurdish  chief,  a  new  and  alarming  experience  for  a  mis- 
sionary when  touring.  The  position  of  the  missionaries  was 
fast  becoming  intolerable  when  the  assassination  or  deposition 
of  Persian  officials  relieved  the  situation.  Through  this  time 
of  fiercer  distress,  the  mission  was  aided  in  part  by  the 
powerful  protection  of  foreign  diplomats,  and  in  yet  larger 
part  by  the  vitality  of  the  gospel  in  the  hearts  of  the  Nestorians. 
Fresh  revivals  set  forward  the  work,  not  only  in  the  seminary, 
but  all  over  the  plain,  in  Urumia,  and  the  mountain  districts. 


206  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

Responding  to  the  call  for  education,  seminaries  for  both  sexes 
were  filled.  The  Bible  was  now  translated  into  the  vernacular, 
and  at  least  2000  could  read  it  intelligently.  In  Geog  Tapa 
seventy  adults  set  themselves  to  learn  to  read,  offering  prizes 
to  those  who  should  successfully  teach  them.  Seventy-three 
free  schools,  with  more  than  1000  boys  and  150  women  and 
girls,  were  scattered  over  the  plain. 

Among  the  new,  unmistakable  signs  was  the  liberal  giving 
of  the  people.  All  the  Nestorians  were  poor;  on  the  bare 
mountains,  when  a  man  was  asked  how  large  was  his  field,  he 
would  say  that  he  sowed  a  half-capful  of  grain,  or  perhaps 
only  a  third;  if  he  could  say  that  he  sowed  more  than  a  capful 
he  was  called  rich.  Even  on  the  plains  there  was  probably 
not  one  person  worth  $2000.  Yet  here  during  the  pinch  of 
the  War  of  the  Rebellion  in  America  the  people  gave  unstintedly 
out  of  their  utter  poverty,  in  some  cases  bringing  from  their 
store  of  food  or  their  few  heirlooms  and  ornaments,  offering 
them  with  outbursts  of  joy  and  gratitude. 

A  rapid  increase  in  the  number  of  native  workers  now  saved 
this  mission  from  collapse.  For,  despite  some  valuable  reen- 
The  for  cements,  from    1858  to   1860  there  were    heavy 

Native  losses   that   sadly  reduced   the   mission's    strength. 

Preachers  xhe  poor  people  pleading  for  missionaries  could  not 
understand  why  it  was  so  hard  to  get  them.  ''Have  you  not 
a  plenty  of  men  in  your  great  country,  the  new  world?"  they 
said;  and  mindful  of  the  Crimean  War,  of  which  report  came 
even  to  these  lonely  mountains,  a  chief  added,  ''Are  there  not 
thousands  of  English  now  fighting  for  the  sultan?" 

It  was  a  cause  for  rejoicing  that  in  1860  the  mission  could 
report  a  band  of  forty-three  native  leaders  operating  twenty- 
eight  outstations.  From  that  time  the  increase  was  even 
more  rapid.  In  1864  there  were  but  seven  missionaries  in  the 
field,  but  there  were  sixty  Nestorian  preachers.  Some  of 
these  proved  men  of  remarkable  power,  such  as  Deacon  Tama, 
whose  approach  to  a  mountain  village  brought  out  the  people, 


IN  TURKEY  AND  THE  LEVANT  207 

literally  spreading  their  garments  in  the  way.  Old  and  young 
would  sit  and  listen  by  the  hour  in  winter,  at  morning  and 
evening,  to  hear  him  discourse  on  the  love  of  Christ.  To  the 
aid  and  comfort  of  these  faithful  native  helpers  was  added  the 
good-will  and  support  of  some  of  the  ecclesiastics,  most  of  all 
of  Mar  Elias.  When  he  died,  in  1863,  it  was  as  though  the 
mission  had  lost  a  loved  member.  Mr.  Rhea  wrote  of  him 
then:  ''All  these  traits  of  Christlike  beauty  combined  to  make 
a  character  which,  in  this  weary  land,  was  a  constant  rest  to 
the  toil-worn  missionary,  —  an  influence  for  good,  continually 
streaming  forth  into  the  darkness  of  spiritual  death  around 
him.  God,  who  accurately  weighs  all  men,  only  knows  how 
much  his  kingdom  in  Persia  has  been  advanced  by  Mar  Ehas, 
than  whom  the  Nestorian  Church  never  had  a  more  spiritual 
and  evangelical  bishop.'' 

The  influence  of  this  reawakened  Christianity  now  began  to 
be  widely  felt  in  the  land,  and  even  by  others  besides  the 

Nestorians.     Persian   and   Kurdish  Mohammedans 
A  "Wider 

Imoression  ^^^®  ^^^  unaffected  by  this  purer  type  of  Chris- 
tianity and,  under  the  special  care  of  Mr.  Shedd,  a 
quiet  and  effective  work  for  Moslems  was  under  way.  Still 
the  Persian  government  was  not  friendly  or  even  tolerant,  and, 
encouraged  by  the  French  Jesuits,  issued  another  proscriptive 
edict  against  schools  and  publications.  The  hostility  of  the 
Papists  was  severe  and  unscrupulous;  whole  families  even  were 
poisoned  by  them  in  the  effort  to  spread  terror  of  the  mis- 
sionaries. 

The  purpose  of  this  mission  as  of  the  others  at  work  among 
the  oriental  Churches  had  been  resolute  not  to  withdraw  con- 
Growing  gregations  or  to  form  separate  organizations,  but 
Church  to  strive  to  accomplish  reform  from  within.  So  at 
^i^®  first  no  evangelical  churches  had  been  established, 

or  church  rites  instituted.  By  1854  some  converts  had  joined 
the  missionaries  in  celebrating  the  Lord's  Supper;  at  length  a 
general  invitation  was  given  to   such  participation.     As  all 


208  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

could  not  come  to  Urumia,  little  groups  gathered  in  the  vil- 
lages over  the  plain  for  this  service,  which  thus  formed  vir- 
tually new  organizations.  Some  of  these  communion  seasons 
were  thrilling  spectacles,  the  people  gathering  to  spend  the 
whole  day  in  a  sort  of  religious  love-feast,  and,  at  its  close, 
assembling  with  quiet  hearts  about  the  table  of  their  Lord. 

After  conference  with  Dr.  Dwight  and  Mr.  Wheeler,  of 
Harpoot,  in  1860-61,  the  policy  of  the  mission  was  somewhat 
changed,  as  more  responsibility  was  put  upon  native  pastors, 
and  their  office  was  emphasized.  It  was  still  hoped  to  avoid 
a  formal  separation  from  the  ancient  church;  yet  it  was  diffi- 
cult to  prevent  a  break,  and  the  situation  was  made  more 
critical  by  the  endeavors  of  the  English  High  Church  party 
to  disrupt  the  evangelical  movement  by  a  reactionary  cam- 
paign. Many  of  the  evangelical  communities  were  eager  to 
withdraw  from  what  seemed  the  hopeless  formalism  of  their 
ancient  church.  Finally,  at  a  general  meeting  of  native  helpers, 
in  1863,  a  plan  was  adopted  that  secured  the  essentials  of  a 
reformed  church,  and  staved  off  the  creating  of  a  new  organiza- 
tion. Now  the  outlook  for  continued  union  seemed  more 
promising.  The  old  missionary  spirit  of  the  Nestorians,  which 
had  stirred  the  heart  of  Stoddard  to  seek  their  reclamation,  was 
revived,  and  in  1870  the  first  steps  were  taken  toward  the 
larger  and  outreaching  life  of  the  mission  to  the  Nestorians. 
To  mark  this  wider  scope  the  name  was  now  changed  to  the 
Mission  to  Persia. 

The  same  year,  1870,  marked  the  death  of  Justin  Perkins, 
whose  thirty-six  years  of  service  covered  the  entire  period 
from  the  beginning  of  the  mission  to  its  transfer  to  the  Pres- 
byterians. Before  his  eyes  a  land  vast  and  practically  unknown 
had  become  famiUar  ground  to  the  Christian  world;  its  moun- 
tains and  plains,  cities,  and  villages  had  all  been  explored. 
Over  a  hundred  workers  had  been  trained  and  sent  forth  as 
heralds  of  the  free  gospel;  seminaries  had  been  equipped;  1000 
pupils  were  gathered  in  the  lower  schools;  a  written  language 


IN  TURKEY  AND  THE  LEVANT  209 

and  the  Bible  in  the  vernacular  were  a  part  of  his  own  con- 
tribution to  the  higher  life  of  the  land.  Woven  in  with  this 
substantial  record  of  accomplishment  are  abundant  and  mov- 
ing stories  of  Christian  heroism,  in  which  conflicts  and  vic- 
tories Dr.  Perkins'  name  is  written  not  only  as  sharer,  but  as 
leader.  As  Secretary  Anderson  said,  he  was  both  prophet  and 
apostle  to  the  Nestorians,  warning  them,  like  Elijah,  of  their 
besetting  sins,  and  yearning  over  them  with  the  gospel  like 
Paul  himself. 

This  mission,  with  such  a  heritage  and  outlook,  the  American 
Board  transferred  to  the  Presbyterians,  retaining  only  that 
portion  of  the  field  in  the  mountains  of  KurcUstan  which  was 
most  intimately  connected  with  the  Board's  other  missions  in 
Turkey. 

For  the  ten  years  from  1850  to  1860  that  part  of  the 
Turkish  empire  lying  between  the  Tigris  and  Euphrates  rivers 
Xhe  constituted   a   separate  field  of   the  Board,  styled 

Assyrian  the  Assyrian  Mission.  This  territory  had  been 
Mission  approached  by  touring  missionaries  from  the  fields 
on  both  sides  of  it,  and  Mosul  was  temporarily  occupied  so 
early  as  1841  as  the  base  from  which  to  reach  the  mountain 
Nestorians.  It  was  now  reopened  as  the  first  station  of  the 
new  mission  to  reach  the  neglected  races  of  that  interior  coun- 
try. So  unlike  were  these  people  in  all  but  name  to  those  of 
Syria  that  it  was  thought  that  work  for  them  would  be  better 
organized  as  a  separate  mission.  Rev.  Dwight  W.  Marsh 
reached  Mosul  in  1850,  to  be  joined  the  following  year  by  Rev. 
William  F.  Williams,  transferred  from  the  Syrian  Mission. 

After  Mosul,  Diarbekir  was  occupied,  far  to  the  north,  and 
long  in  mind  as  a  strategic  point  to  be  gained.  A  wild  and 
romantic  country  was  now  opened  up  to  missionary  work, 
where  the  people  were  like  their  land.  The  whole  course  of 
this  mission,  indeed,  was  the  record  of  facing  difficulties  and 
dangers  such  as  tested  missionary  fiber  to  the  utmost.  The 
first  arrivals  were  set  upon  by  Kurdish  robbers,  and  all  but 


210  STORY   OF  THE  AMERICAN   BOARD 

killed.  When  Dr.  Lobdell  in  1852  stopped  at  Diarbekir,  as 
Mr.  Dunmore  was  showing  him  about  the  city,  a  rabble  rushed 
on  them  like  tigers,  beating  one  and  seizing  the  other  by  the 
throat,  and,  when  they  broke  away,  following  and  stoning 
them  until  they  escaped.  Whereupon  the  Lobdells  closed  their 
visit,  pitched  their  tent  on  a  raft  of  120  inflated  goat  skins, 
and  floated  in  four  days  down  the  Tigris  to  Mosul.  Dr.  Lob- 
dell's  comment  on  this  journey  reveals  the  caliber  of  the  man 
as  well  as  the  character  of  the  trip:  "The  Arabs  who  swam  out 
upon  their  skins  and  the  Kurds  armed  to  the  teeth  upon  the 
shore  were  alike  unable  to  touch  us,  as  the  river  was  unusually 
high  and  swift.  We  had  just  fear  enough  to  make  the  trip 
interesting." 

There  were  a  host  of  such  daring  adventures   involved  in 

the  founding  of  this  mission,  like  the  journey  of  Mr.  Marsh 

through  the  Jebal  Tour,  a  stronghold  of  the  Jacob- 

T,.  ites   in   the   Kurdish   mountains,   or   Dr.    Lobdell's 

Pioneers  .       ' 

visit  to  Bagdad  to  confer  with  the  English  ambas- 
sador about  the  prevailing  lawlessness.  But  the  daily  round 
was  a  succession  of  wearing  and  even  alarming  persecution. 
Missionaries  were  continually  stoned  and  hooted  in  the  streets 
of  the  city.  The  story  of  what  Mr.  Williams  faced  at  Mosul, 
and  later  at  Mardin,  is  one  long  record  of  heroic  and  uncom- 
plaining service.  The  one  protest  is  that  reenforcements  do 
not  come.  ''As  fast,"  writes  Mr.  Williams,  in  1856,  ''as  famine, 
hardship,  sickness,  cannon-balls  thin  the  ranks  of  the  allied 
armies  before  Sebastopol,  others  are  sent  to  fill  their  places; 
for  the  nations  are  in  earnest.  Will  the  churches  show  as 
much  zeal?" 

The  strain  upon  these  pioneers  wore  them  out.  Dr.  Lobdell, 
fearless,  tireless,  winning  his  way  every^vhere  by  his  medical 
skill,  endured  but  four  years  of  service  and  died  at  twenty- 
eight;  Dunmore,  hero  of  Diarbekir,  and  afterward  of  Harpoot, 
a  retiring  but  most  dependable  man,  of  whom  Mr.  Walker, 
his  successor,  said,  ''There  is  comparatively  little  accomplished 


IN  TURKEY  AND  THE   LEVANT  211 

in  Diarbekir,  Arabkir,  Harpoot,  and  Moosh,  which  is  not, 
under  God,  due  to  this  brother,"  was  compelled  because  of 
his  wife's  faihng  health  to  return  to  the  United  States  in  1856, 
the  year  that  Lobdell  died. 

With  the  missionaries  suifered  all  who  were  associated  with 
them.  They,  too,  endured  as  seeing  Him  who  is  invisible. 
When  a  young  man  of  Diarbekir,  talented  and  prosperous, 
announced  himself  a  Protestant,  his  bishop  tried  to  bribe  him 
to  recant.  ''Go  tell  the  bishop,"  he  said,  ''that  I  did  not 
become  a  Protestant  for  money,  and  that  I  will  not  leave  them 
for  money,  even  should  he  give  me  my  house  full  of  gold." 
Here  was  a  predestined  leader  soon  to  go  to  Bebek,  and,  on 
his  return,  to  become  the  pastor  of  the  new  Diarbekir  church. 
With  such  leaders  the  work  was  bound  to  grow.  Persecution 
seemed  only  to  refine  and  strengthen  the  churches.  Deep 
impression  was  made  even  on  the  Turks.  Diarbekir  showed 
great  increase  during  the  later  '50s;  Mardin,  also,  seat  of 
two  patriarchates  and  a  stronghold  both  of  the  Jacobite  and 
Roman  Churches,  responded  to  the  new  message. 

The  missionaries  were  full  of  gratitude  and  rejoicing  in 
1860,  when  these  stations  were  merged  with  the  newly  organized 
Eastern  Turkey  Mission,  and  the  name  of  Assyria  dropped 
from  the  Board's  list. 

The  Board  began  its  work  in  European  Turkey  in  1858. 
For  some  time  attention  had  been  turned  to  this  part  of  the 
Entering  empire  as  a  strategic  missionary  field.  Dr.  Hamlin 
European  on  a  visit  to  England,  in  1856,  enlisted  the  substan- 
Turkey  ^[^i  ^id  of  friends  there,  notably  the  Earl  of  Shaftes- 
bury and  the  Turkish  Missions  Aid  Society  in  the  needy  and 
important  lands  which  Turkey  held  in  Europe.  It  was  felt 
that  in  this  middle  ground  between  East  and  West,  where 
four  millions  of  Moslems  were  in  close  contact  with  western 
civilization,  and  where  also  the  various  Christian  sects  touched 
western  Christianity,  there  was  a  field  not  to  be  passed  over 
in  any  effort  to  carry  the  gospel  into  Asia.     Moreover,  the 


212  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

Bulgarians,  the  leading  race  in  the  Balkans,  ambitious,  pro- 
gressive, and  liberty-loving,  made  a  particular  appeal  to  the 
sympathies  of  the  civilized  world.  In  1857  Dr.  Hamlin,  with 
a  representative  of  the  Turkish  Missions  Aid  Society,  whose 
help  to  the  Board  in  all  its  missions  in  this  land  is  alwa3^s  to 
be  gratefully  recognized,  made  a  tour  of  investigation  and 
brought  back  a  glowing  report.  They  found  a  people  poor 
and  ignorant  indeed,  yet  thrifty  and  eager  for  learning. 

This  would  be  an  expensive  mission,  admitted  the  explorers, 
with  different  languages,  races,  and  religions  to  reach,  but  the 
doors  seemed  open  and  the  prospect  full  of  promise.  By  an 
understanding  with  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church  North, 
of  America,  the  Board  took  for  its  share  of  the  land  to  be 
cultivated  the  region  south  of  the  Balkans,  placing  its  first 
missionaries.  Rev.  and  Mrs.  C.  F.  Morse,  at  Adrianople,  a 
border  city.  Soon  they  were  joined  by  Rev.  and  Mrs.  T.  L. 
Byington,  the  Meriams,  Clarks,  and  Haskells,  a  considerable 
reenforcement  in  numbers  and  destined  to  shape  the  life  of 
this  new  mission.  Though  Dr.  Byington  was  not  spared  to  a 
long  term  of  service,  his  years  in  Bulgaria  marked  him  as  a 
leader  and  true  founder.  PhiHppopohs  was  made  the  second 
station.  As  the  Moslem  peoples  were  within  the  aim  of  the 
mission's  undertaking,  it  was  arranged  that  one  missionary 
at  each  station  should  learn  Turkish. 

But  the  roseate  hopes  of  rapid  progress  in  the  new  field 
were  hardly  borne  out.  The  eagerness  for  the  Scriptures 
which  had  been  noted  proved  not  to  be  a  desire 
^   ,  to  know  them  so  much  as  to  possess  them  as  a 

charm.  There  was  little  interest  in  a  spiritual 
religion,  and  great  fear  of  loss  of  patriotism  by  any  change  of 
religion.  Race  jealousies  kept  the  land  in  turmoil;  fear  and 
suspicion  destroyed  honesty  and  manly  independence.  Many 
vicissitudes,  most  shocking  of  all,  the  shooting  of  Mr.  Meriam 
by  robbers,  as  he  was  returning  from  the  mission  meeting  in 
Constantinople,  in  1862,  and  the  death  of  his  wife  from  the 


IN  TURKEY  AND  THE  LEVANT  213 

suffering  and  exposure  of  the  event,  entailed  a  reduction  of 
forces  and  rearrangement  of  locations. 

It  was  the  customary  slow  foundation  work,  preparing  a 
literature  to  meet  the  situation  and  establishing  schools  to 
train  youth.  The  necessities  of  these  tasks  kept  the  mis- 
sionaries alert  and  the  success  of  the  schools,  notably  one  for 
girls  at  Eski  Zaghra,  and  another  for  young  men  at  Philippop- 
olis,  put  heart  in  them.  These  schools  also  had  their  trials. 
Influential  parents  at  Eski  Zaghra  withdrew  their  girls  when 
the  Protestant  character  of  the  school  was  understood,  and 
in  1867  a  mob  attacked  it,  and  would  have  carried  off  the 
scholars  but  for  the  coolness  and  vigor  of  Mr.  Morse  in  with- 
standing them.  Here,  too,  an  appeal  to  the  new  law  of  relig- 
ious liberty,  together  with  the  help  of  friendly  officials,  brought 
good  results  even  from  persecution.  The  school  for  young 
men,  called  ''The  Collegiate  and  Theological  Institute,"  was 
started  in  1860  with  the  gift  of  £300  from  a  friend  in  England. 
Beginning  with  four  pupils,  in  ten  years  it  came  to  have  about 
thirty  students.  Under  the  narrower  educational  policy,  which 
now  dominated  the  Board's  Turkish  missions  as  those  in 
India,  it  was  temporarily  closed;  then  reopened  with  some 
shifts  of  location,  until  it  was  finally  reestablished  in  1871  at 
Samokov,  to  which  city  the  Girls'  Boarding  School  was  also 
moved  in  that  same  year.  Here  both  schools  began  a  new 
era  of  life  with  larger  purpose  and  accomplishment. 

So  far  work  in  this  part  of  the  empire  had  been  administered 
as  a  part  of  the  Western  Turkey  Mission.  With  the  occupa- 
Xhe  tion  of  Samokov  in  1869  there  were  four  stations; 

Mission  the  field  and  the  forces  were  ready  now  for  inde- 
Organized,  pendent  life.  On  June  30,  1871,  the  initial  annual 
^71  meeting  was  held  at  Eski  Zaghra.     To  this  meeting 

Dr.  Riggs  brought  the  first  bound  volume  of  the  Bulgarian 
Bible,  thus  offering  to  the  fourth  mission  with  which  he  had 
been  connected  the  fruit  of  his  last  twelve  years  of  labor. 
With  this  Bible  on  the  table  and  the  little  company  kneeling 


214  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN   BOARD 

around  it,  was  formally  organized  the  European  Turkey  Mis- 
sion, which,  as  Secretary  Clark,  who  was  present  as  a  visitor, 
remarked,  was  the  first  mission  of  the  Board  that  from  its 
beginning  had  the  Bible  in  the  language  which  the  people 
could  understand. 

With  the  organizing  in  1871  of  the  first  evangelical  church 
in  Macedonia  at  Bansko  and  in  1875  of  the  Bulgarian  Evan- 
gehcal  Society  the  native  agency  which  from  that  day  to 
this  has  been  of  prime  importance  in  spreading  the  printed 
and  preached  Word  over  the  land,  it  seemed  that  the  mission 
had  fairly  won  its  way.  But  opposition  and  difficulty  were 
not  yet  cleared  from  the  path.  In  the  fearful  times  of  1876-78, 
when  Bulgaria  became  a  separate  principality  through  insur- 
rection and  war,  the  mission  suffered  a  yet  more  fiery  test. 
The  horrible  massacres  of  the  revolution  and  the  ravage  of 
the  Russo-Turkish  war  spread  terror  and  tumult  through  the 
land.  Regular  mission  work  was  for  the  most  part  suspended; 
people  were  hiding  in  the  mountains;  missionary  families  were 
compelled  to  retreat  to  Constantinople.  Eski  Zaghra  was 
destroyed;  Samokov threatened.  School  premises  were  patrolled 
by  guards.  Turkish  officers  and  neighbors  protected  the  mis- 
sionaries, but  at  Eski  Zaghra  all  their  possessions  were  lost; 
in  Samokov,  however,  their  property  was  saved. 

Here,  as  elsewhere  in  times  of  calamity,  the  missionaries 
became  the  first  and  most  efficient  ministers  of  relief.  The- 
period  closes  thus  with  the  work  of  this  mission  hardly  recov- 
ered from  the  excitement  of  the  political  revolution.  Yet 
those  who  could  look  below  the  surface  of  events  recognized 
even  then  the  success  of  the  hard  years  of  laying  foundations. 
The  Marquis  of  Bath,  in  a  volume  on  Bulgaria  pubhshed  at 
that  time,  paid  this  significant  tribute  to  the  missionaries: 
''They  have  aroused  the  jealousy  and  excited  the  suspicions  of 
no  political  party.  In  the  darkest  times  of  Turkish  rule  they 
relieved  the  needy  and  succored  the  oppressed.  No  religious 
test  has  been  imposed  on  admission  into  their  schools;  and  there 


IN  TURKEY  AND  THE   LEVANT  215 

is  hardly  a  town  in  Bulgaria  where  persons  are  not  to  be  found 
who  owe  to  them  the  advantages  of  a  superior  education. 
The  result  of  their  teaching  has  permeated  all  Bulgarian  society, 
and  is  not  the  least  important  of  the  causes  that  have  rendered 
the  people  capable  of  wisely  using  the  freedom  so  suddenly 
conferred  upon  them." 

The  charter  of  religious  liberty,  extorted  from  the  sultan 
in  1856  and  published  and  made  the  law  of  the  land  in  1860, 
The  New  ^^^  ^^^  P^^  ^^  ^^^  ^^  religious  persecution.  Some 
Era  for  the  0^  the  most  bitter  outbreaks  of  fanaticism  occurred 
Armenians,  in  the  years  immediately  following.  In  1860  a 
i860  (See  yelling  mob  of  Armenians  prevented  by  violence  a 
p.  201)  Protestant   burial   in   Constantinople;    in  1861   oc- 

curred the  expulsion  of  the  Coffings  from  Hadjin,  followed  by 
the  shooting  of  Mr.  Coffing  and  his  Armenian  companions  near 
Alexandretta,  as  they  were  on  their  way  to  the  annual  meeting 
of  the  mission;  at  Mardin,  Protestants  were  cruelly  oppressed 
by  Roman  Catholic  and  Gregorian  ecclesiastics;  in  1865  two 
Christian  Moslems  were  forced  into  the  army  and  secretly 
despatched,  on  refusing  to  flee;  the  Porte  itself  violated  its 
own  edict  in  1864,  when  it  seized  presses,  closed  book  stores, 
and  imprisoned  its  subjects,  in  fanatic  fear  of  Christian 
advances. 

Notwithstanding  such  painful  and  hindering  events,  ground 
was  gained  for  the  missionary  cause  in  Turkey.  Little  by 
little  a  foothold  had  been  secured.  The  situation  now  was  far 
different  from  that  of  the  pioneers.  The  advance  of  the 
gospel  among  the  Armenians  was  a  continual  amazement  and 
joy.  When,  in  1860,  Dr.  Dwight  made  a  second  tour  over 
Turkey,  traversing  almost  the  same  ground  as  in  the  journey 
of  1830,  he  found  the  improved  outward  conditions,  marked 
by  the  telegraph  and  post-road,  not  so  great  as  the  religious 
transformation.  Whereas  then  he  discovered  no  sympathy 
or  interest  anywhere  for  his  message,  he  now  found  centers 
of  light  at  every  stage  of  his  journey.     Of  these  stations  as  a 


216  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

whole  he  could  have  said,  as  he  did  of  Marash,  ''This  place 
is  indeed  a  missionary  wonder." 

It  was  not  strange  that  with  this  rapid  growth  fresh  dangers 
should  appear.  The  young  churches  and  slightly  trained 
leaders  were  not  unnaturally  flushed  with  their  own 
p    .   ,  success  and  inclined  to  be  headstrong.     Some  per- 

sonal or  factional  quarrels  broke  out,  as  in  the  Pera 
church,  which  for  a  time  was  alienated  from  the  mission; 
divisions  were  threatened,  and  the  good  name  of  the  Protestants 
and  their  cause  was  in  danger  of  being  brought  into  reproach. 
It  was  a  time  requiring  careful  behavior  and  a  wise  policy  of 
administration. 

The  mission  faced  the  situation  earnestly.  The  recent 
visit  of  Secretary  Anderson  had  promulgated  those  ideas  of 
policy  that  he  had  advocated  in  India  and  Ceylon.  The 
Turkish  missions  accepted  heartily  the  plan  of  putting  much 
responsibility  on  native  Christians  and  native  churches.  Not 
only  for  their  own  sakes,  but  for  the  sake  of  the  Moslems  yet 
to  be  reached,  it  was  important  that  the  evangelical  Armenians 
should  manifest  a  self-reliant  and  self-devoted  spirit.  If  these 
responsibilities  of  the  native  church  were  to  be  worthily  met, 
the  training  of  a  native  ministry  and  the  development  of 
theological  seminaries  was  a  matter  of  prime  concern. 

Hitherto  the  seminary  at  Bebek  had  been  the  training 
school  for  the  ministry,  but  by  the  expansion  of  the  field  it  was 
now  remote  from  the  large  and  growing  centers  of  mission 
work;  if  students  were  transported  to  it,  after  fife  in  the  capital, 
they  were  apt  to  return  unfitted  for  the  poorer  conditions  of 
the  interior.  Moreover,  Bebek  had  stood  for  a  broad  idea  of 
education.  The  influence  of  Secretary  Anderson's  revised 
policy,  which  sought  to  discourage  English  studies  even  for  the 
native  ministry,  discredited  somewhat  the  method  at  Bebek, 
that  before  had  not  been  unanimously  approved  by  Dr. 
Hamlin's  colleagues.  The  proposal  was  now  made  to 
transfer  the  theological  seminary  to  the  interior  and  to  confine 


IN  TURKEY  AND  THE  LEVANT      217 

it  strictly  to  a  vernacular  school.  Dr.  Hamlin  at  length  decided 
to  accept  an  invitation  coming  from  Mr.  Christopher  R. 
Robert,  of  New  York,  to  assist  in  founding  at  Constantinople  a 
Christian  college,  planned  to  furnish  higher  education  for  all 
races  in  the  empire.  Thereupon  the  seminary  at  Bebek,  after 
noble  service  for  nearly  a  score  of  eventful  years,  was  sus- 
pended in  1862.  In  1865  a  training  seminary  was  opened  in 
Marsovan,  and  the  same  year  the  Girls'  Boarding  School,  which 
had  been  doing  splendid  work  in  preparing  teachers  and  church 
workers  for  all  parts  of  the  empire,  was  also  moved  to  Marsovan. 
In  several  cases  station  training-schools  were  organized,  and 
before  long  there  were  beginnings  of  theological  seminaries  at 
such  important  centers  as  Harpoot,  Marsovan,  Marash,  and 
Mardin,  with  theological  classes  at  half  a  dozen  other  places. 
But  for  nearly  a  generation  European  languages  were  not 
taught  in  the  mission  schools;  most  of  the  instruction  was 
given  in  the  vernacular. 

The  increase  in  these  training-schools  indicates  how  many 
stations  were  becoming  centers  of  influence  and  leadership  for 
The  large  districts.     The  growth   of  some  of  the  mis- 

Growing  sionary  strongholds  was  phenomenal;  one  year's 
Stations  report  in  the  Western  Turkey  Mission  showed  a 
fifty  per  cent  gain  in  every  line  of  effort  but  one.  From  the 
stations  in  the  far  interior  came  like  stories  of  rewarded  effort. 
Such  good  showing  was  due  in  part  to  the  number  of  places 
newly  opened,  like  Tarsus  in  Central  Turkey,  then  an  out- 
station  of  Adana,  which  reported  100  per  cent  increase  in 
church  and  congregation  in  one  year,  and  Hassan  Beyli,  a 
little  village  in  the  mountains  of  that  same  region,  whose  men 
had  ''stood  in  the  front  rank  of  theft,  robbery,  and  murders," 
and  were  the  terror  of  all  travelers  in  the  country  until,  subdued 
by  the  government,  they  began  to  desire  books  and  the  gospel, 
and,  by  1868,  had  a  regular  Protestant  community  with  a 
native  pastor. 

In  many  of  the  older  stations  the  first  enthusiasm  of  the 


218  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

reformation  was  now  past.  There  was  some  falling  off  of 
adherents.  To  meet  the  special  need  of  the  time  there  came 
a  series  of  marked  revivals  in  station  after  station,  increasing 
the  good-will  and  loyalty  of  many,  deepening  and  spiritual- 
izing the  religious  life  of  the  churches,  and  preventing  both 
missionary  and  native  worker  from  becoming  absorbed  in  the 
mechanical  routine  of  this  enlarging  work.  The  revival  of 
1861  in  Marash  not  only  elevated  the  standard  of  piety,  but 
quickened  the  evangelistic  zeal  of  the  church.  New  attempts 
to  reach  Mohammedans  were  made,  with  special  promise 
in  Central  Turkey.  The  revivals  of  1866  and  1869  were 
notable;  many  were  connected  with  the  week  of  prayer,  as  at 
Bitlis,  in  1866,  where  the  fire  burned  through  all  the  deep  snows 
and  bitter  cold  of  winter;  and  at  Harpoot  that  same  year, 
when  three  of  the  most  prominent  men  of  the  community 
identified  themselves  with  the  Evangelicals.  And  the  interest 
spread  over  the  entire  plain.  In  1869  there  were  fresh  awaken- 
ings at  many  stations  of  Eastern  and  Central  Turkey;  at 
Marash  the  week  of  prayer  was  described  as  a  jubilee. 

All  this  enlargement  and  development  of  the  fields  multi- 
pUed  the  need  of  native  leaders  as  well  as  the  constituency 
The  from   which    they    could   be    drawn.     The    greater 

Native  emphasis  now  being  put  upon  native  responsibility 

Agency  reenforced  the  demands  made  upon  the  theological 
seminaries  and  the  station  training-schools  to  provide  a 
larger  force  of  workers.  Under  such  pressure  the  Turkish 
missions  became  foremost  in  the  development  of  a  native 
agency.  By  1866  the  Western  Turkey  Mission  had  eighty- 
nine  native  helpers.  Some  of  them  became  conspicuous  wit- 
nesses for  Christ,  declaring  his  gospel  as  much  by  their  renewed 
lives  as  by  their  words;  a  marvel  and  rebuke  to  their  neighbors 
and  an  example  to  their  weaker  brethren,  they  were  the  joy 
and  crown  of  the  missionaries'  labor.  One  such  man,  called 
''the  prince  of  colporters,"  near  Nicomedia,  not  only  lost  his 
vineyards  and    mulberry  orchards,   but  endured  violence  for 


IN  TURKEY  AND  THE  LEVANT  219 

Christ's  sake.  When  the  Uttle  church  in  his  village  was  built, 
he  brought  a  basket  of  stones  and  brickbats,  that  had  been 
thrown  through  his  windows,  to  be  used  in  the  foundation 
wall.  Of  his  sufferings  he  said,  ^'The  truth  in  my  heart  was 
like  a  stake  slightly  driven  into  soft  ground,  easily  swayed, 
and  in  danger  of  falling  before  the  wind;  but  by  the  sledge- 
hammer of  persecution  God  drove  it  in  till  it  became  immov- 
able." Shouldering  his  basket  of  books,  so  long  as  his  strength 
permitted  he  traversed  a  wide  region  by  the  Black  Sea,  until 
it  was  reckoned  that  not  less  than  100,000  persons  had  heard 
from  his  lips  the  message  of  the  gospel. 

In  Eastern  Turkey  native  preachers  were  now  appearing 
rapidly.  In  Harpoot  alone,  in  1864,  eighteen  young  men,  the 
first  class  of  theological  students  there  trained,  entered  upon 
their  work.  The  prominence  of  this  mission  herein  was  due 
preeminently  to  Rev.  Crosby  H.  Wheeler  who,  at  Harpoot, 
was  using  all  the  strength  of  his  genius  and  commanding  per- 
sonality in  developing  self-supporting  churches.  The  prin- 
ciples which  Wheeler  and  his  associates  stoutly  maintained 
were  the  immediate  independence  of  the  churches  from  mis- 
sionary control,  the  establishment  in  all  cases  of  a  native  pas- 
torate, and  the  right  and  duty  of  each  church  to  choose  its 
own  pastor  and  to  assume  the  responsibility  of  his  support. 
Familiar  and  generally  accepted  as  these  principles  are  on 
mission  fields  to-day,  they  were  not  so  commonly  approved  in 
the  '60s;  even  in  Turkey  some  of  the  missionaries  distrusted 
them  and  many  of  the  churches  did  not  wish  any  such  inde- 
pendence. By  1857,  within  a  decade  of  the  beginning  of 
missionary  work  at  Aintab,  the  First  Church  there  was  main- 
taining its  own  pastor;  but  that  was  an  exceptional  case.  It 
took  seven  years  of  patient  pressure  to  bring  the  Harpoot 
Church  to  full  self-support.  But  Wheeler  never  faltered;  in 
season  and  out  of  season  he  preached  the  gospel  of  self-sup- 
porting churches  to  his  theological  students.  And  to  the 
intense  energy  of  this  leader  was  added  the  statesmanship  of 


220  STORY   OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

his  quiet  but  masterly  associate,  Rev.  Herman  N.  Barnum, 
the  backbone  of  that  Harpoot  station.  At  last  they  won 
their  case.  By  1870  nearly  one-half  the  churches  in  the  Har- 
poot field  maintained  their  pastors,  and  the  principle  of  self- 
support  was  generally  accepted,  not  for  one  mission,  but  for  all. 

This  emphasis  on  native  control  and  leadership  required 
emphasis  also  upon  the  education  of  leaders.  Wheeler  at 
jfirst  accepted  the  policy  of  vernacular  education;  at  Harpoot 
no  English  was  to  be  taught  to  lure  pupils  into  commercial 
vocations.  Schools  were  kept  simple,  with  the  Bible  the  main 
text-book,  that  they  might  be  the  agency  of  a  wide  religious 
education.  It  was  the  rule  always  to  charge  tuition,  to  put  a 
price  on  all  books  and  portions  of  Scripture,  to  give  away 
nothing,  but  to  teach  self-help  from  the  start. 

The  coming  of  Rev.  T.  C.  Trowbridge  from  Constantinople 
to  Marash,  in  1868,  to  aid  the  new  theological  training-school, 
brought  to  the  Central  Turkey  Mission  an  effective  leader  in 
the  cause  of  developing  native  responsibility.  The  broad 
policy  of  cooperation  which  then  became  characteristic  of 
this  mission  has  been  an  important  and  growing  factor  of 
its  success. 

As  the  native  churches  increased  in  number  and  power,  they 
began  to  group  themselves  in  local  or  district  unions  for  better 
Advance  in  cooperation.  In  1865  the  historic  Bithynia  Union 
Organiza-  was  organized  in  the  Western  Turkey  Mission;  the 
tionand  following  year  a  similar  ''Evangelical  Union"  was 
Establish-  formed  in  Eastern  Turkey.  By  1870  the  number 
°^®^*  had  grown  to  four.     These  unions  were  really  mis- 

sionary agencies  of  the  churches.  The  Harpoot  Union  in  1866 
undertook  a  mission  in  the  wild  Kurdish  country  east  of  Diar- 
bekir,  a  heroic  undertaking,  in  which  a  dozen  feeble  churches 
sent  forth  seven  of  their  choicest  young  men.  At  the  same 
time  fifty  or  more  outstations  were  being  occupied  and  worked 
in  the  Harpoot  field  alone. 

At  the   capital,  as  in  the  provinces,  the  evangelical  cause 


IN  TURKEY  AND  THE  LEVANT  221 

had  secured  a  more  substantial  hold  and  new  lines  of  work 
were  opening.  The  disaffections  which  had  made  church 
work  drag  for  a  time  in  Constantinople  were  lessening;  the 
outlook  was  brighter.  Reform  movements  were  stirring  in 
the  old  Armenian  Church.  A  party  called  the  '' Enlightened," 
named  after  Gregory  the  Illuminator,  was  growing  in  numbers 
and  force.  The  founding  of  a  Reformed  Armenian  Church 
was  projected,  and  a  Reformed  Prayer-book  had  been  issued 
and  promptly  anathematized  by  the  patriarch. 

Two  new  establishments  in  Constantinople  were  now  con- 
spicuous witnesses  to  its  occupation  by  evangelical  Chris- 
tianity. One  was  Robert  College.  This  institution,  founded 
in  1863,  modestly  pursued  its  task,  while  Hamlin  waged  his 
seven  years'  bloodless  war  for  permission  to  build  on  the  pur- 
chased site  overlooking  the  Bosphorus.  At  last  reluctant  per- 
mission was  given,  and  in  1871  its  doors  were  opened  to  welcome 
such  an  influx  of  students  that  a  new  and  larger  building  was 
at  once  undertaken.  The  other  establishment  was  in  the 
heart  of  the  city,  the  commodious  Bible  House,  thenceforth 
to  be  the  headquarters  of  mission  work  in  Turkey  and  the 
center  of  the  huge  publication  enterprise,  a  force  of  first  magni- 
tude in  the  evangelizing  of  the  empire. 

When  Smith  and  Dwight  made  their  tour  of  the  interior  in 
1830,  they  did  not  hear  of  one  school  anywhere  for  the  educa- 
tion of  girls.  The  women  of  Turkey  of  all  races 
^  and  religions  were  in  hard  and  degrading  positions; 

they  were  the  beasts  of  burden  in  the  fields,  drudges 
in  the  house,  or  idle  prisoners  in  the  harem.  It  was  not  easy 
at  first  for  the  missionaries  to  do  much  for  the  women,  who 
had  little  aspiration  for  themselves,  and  whose  lords  and  mas- 
ters rated  them  scarcely  above  their  donkeys.  In  the  cities, 
notably  Constantinople  and  Smyrna,  there  were  many  educated 
women,  some  indeed  among  the  Moslems,  so  that  the  offering 
of  educational  privileges  to  women  was  undertaken  by  the 
missionaries  almost  from   the  first.     A  school   for  girls  was 


222  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

opened  at  Smyrna  in  1836,  though  it  was  not  long  under  mis- 
sionary control;  in  1845  the  Female  Seminary  at  Pera  in  Con- 
stantinople was  under  way  with  eight  pupils,  and  the  numbers 
soon  increased.  The  labors  of  Miss  Lovell  and  Mrs.  Everett 
in  this  school,  and  later  of  Miss  West,  stand  out  in  those 
earlier  years  as  the  forerunner  of  that  education  of  woman- 
kind by  and  by  to  become  general  through  the  land.  Even 
at  the  time  its  influence  spread  somewhat  beyond  the  capital. 
There  is  a  telling  picture  so  early  as  1846  of  a  school  for  girls 
in  Nicomedia,  maintained  by  an  Armenian,  Der  Haratoon, 
who  worked  at  his  tinner's  trade  while  before  his  work-bench 
he  ranged  his  classes  of  twenty  young  girls,  who  read  to  him 
their  lessons.  Early  in  1866  Bible  women  began  to  be  employed 
in  Constantinople,  with  funds  provided  by  the  American  Bible 
Society,  and  found  immediate  welcome  in  Armenian  homes. 
By  that  time,  also,  in  several  stations  efforts  were  being  made 
to  teach  and  train  the  women.  Miss  Myra  A.  Proctor  in 
1860  had  opened  at  Aintab  the  Girls'  Seminary,  which,  cele- 
brating its  semi-centennial  this  year,  is  the  oldest  institution 
of  its  kind  in  the  interior. 

But  with  the  organization  of  the  Woman's  Boards  of  Mis- 
sions this  work  for  women  became  at  once  more  systematized 
and  developed,  and  the  woman  missionary  was  also  touring 
the  land  on  her  particular  errand.  Mr.  Parmelee's  account  of 
the  experiences  of  one  missionary  woman  brings  out  the  heroism 
involved  in  this  new  department  of  effort:  ''She  had  a  very 
small  fraction  of  a  room;  at  night  she  shared  it  with  four  or 
five  members  of  the  family,  and  during  the  day  her  room  was 
the  family  kitchen,  dining-room,  and  place  of  all  work.  To 
live  in  this  way  for  weeks,  without  a  moment's  quiet,  with 
no  place  of  retirement,  with  no  confidential  companion,  is  a 
missionary  trial  which  many  of  us  would  hesitate  to  incur." 

In  1872  the  Girls'  Boarding  School  at  Constantinople  was 
successfully  inaugurated  by  the  Woman's  Board  of  Missions. 
Great  expectations  were  cherished  for  this  school,  which  began 


IN  TURKEY  AND  THE  LEVANT      223 

with  only  two  pupils,  but  no  one  then  dreamed  that  it  would 
grow  to  be  the  important  American  College  for  Girls  at  Con- 
stantinople. 

Missionary  work  in  Turkey  had  not  got  beyond  violent 
opposition  even  in  the  70s.  The  Schneiders  in  Broosa,  in 
Surmount-  1872,  had  the  windows  of  their  house  broken  by 
ing  Obsta-  brickbats;  Mr.  Baldwin  at  Manissa  was  also  as- 
^^®^  saulted.     The  Turkish  government  itself  sought  to 

block  the  progress  of  the  missionaries,  especially  in  any  approach 
to  Mohammedans.  Even  the  grand  vizier  openly  declared,  in 
spite  of  all  firmans  of  religious  liberty,  that  conversions  from 
Mohammedanism  must  be  an  impossibility  under  a  govern- 
ment which  rests  upon  a  Mohammedan  basis. 

The  year  1873  brought  a  long  drought,  with  failure  of  crops 
and  famine  conditions,  aggravated  by  an  exceptionally  cold 
and  snowy  winter.  The  resulting  distress  was  such  as  the 
missionaries  had  never  seen  in  Asia  Minor,  and  all  the  resources 
of  the  Western  Turkey  Mission  were  heavily  taxed  to  render 
some  relief.  Work  at  many  of  the  stations  was  practically 
blocked.  But  nothing  seemed  to  stop  the  evangelical  advance. 
Protestant  communities  were  growing  fast  in  prestige,  resources, 
and  purpose.  The  stir  of  impending  changes  in  the  social 
and  political  life  of  the  land  gave  zest  to  missionary  endeavor. 
The  long-desired  station  was  opened  at  Van,  'Hhe  Sebastopol 
of  the  Armenian  Church,"  where,  despite  intense  opposition, 
in  five  years  (1877)  a  church  was  organized,  also  an  evan- 
gelical society  for  home  missionary  work  in  the  outlying  dis- 
trict. The  danger  of  a  schism  in  the  church  at  Diarbekir 
through  the  sudden  launching  of  a  ritualistic  movement  was 
avoided  by  the  skill  and  patience  of  the  Harpoot  missionaries. 
In  Western  Turkey  Dr.  West's  medical  work  was  winning 
wide  regard,  as  his  former  students,  now  in  practise  for  them- 
selves, extended  his  influence  through  the  region  about  Sivas. 
In  this  field,  too,  the  interest  of  the  missionaries  was  being 
awakened  in  the  Kuzzlebash  Kurds,  a  pagan  people,  lightly 


224  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

touched  with  one  form  of  Mohammedanism.  There  were 
happy  and  cheering  signs  that  racial  animosities  were  breaking 
down  as  Greek  and  Armenian  students  hved  and  worked 
together  in  the  seminary  at  Marsovan,  while  at  Talas  a  con- 
gregation of  300  had  been  built  up,  about  equally  divided 
between  the  two  races. 

Near  the  end  of  this  period,  leading  up  to  1880,  the  move- 
ment for  higher  educational  institutions  was  well  under  way. 
The  Era  of  Robert  College  at  Constantinople  and  the  Syrian 
Higher  Protestant  College  at  Beirut  had  conspicuously 
Education  demonstrated  to  the  Board  as  to  all  observers  the 
call  for  such  work.  Dr.  Wheeler  at  Harpoot  had  reversed 
his  views  concerning  the  need  of  a  broad  education,  and  was 
working  night  and  day  to  get  a  college  at  Harpoot.  By  1876 
he  had  secured  the  basis  of  an  endowment  of  $50,000,  largely 
by  his  own  and  his  wife's  irresistible  solici tings  while  they 
were  in  America.  In  1878  this  institution,  first  called  Armenia 
College  and  afterward  Euphrates  College,  was  incorporated 
with  a  board  of  trustees  in  Massachusetts.  Four  years  earlier 
another  institution,  known  as  the  Central  Turkey  College  and 
located  at  Aintab,  had  been  chartered,  also  in  Massachusetts, 
the  Turkish  government  giving  its  permission  in  1878,  two 
years  after  the  first  class  had  been  formed.  To  this  new 
college  came  Protestants,  Gregorians,  Moslems,  Roman  Cath- 
olics, and  Jews,  and  people  of  various  nationalities  and 
religious  beliefs  contributed  toward  its  establishment;  from 
the  beginning  and  increasingly  the  people  of  the  land  have 
shared  in  its  management  and  work.  Dr.  Trowbridge  under- 
took to  raise  funds  in  America  and  England.  The  high  schools, 
boarding-schools,  and  seminaries,  which  had  been  gradually 
increasing,  now  served  as  preparatory  schools  for  the  colleges 
while  furnishing  training  for  graduates  of  village  and  station 
schools.  The  reaction  was  thus  complete  from  the  limited 
educational  policy,  against  which  Dr.  Hamlin  had  contended 
apparently  in  vain. 


IN  TURKEY  AND  THE  LEVANT  225 

Once  more,  as  the  period  closed,  the  Turkish  empire  was 
involved  in  war,  in  the  conflict  with  Russia  in  1877.  As  in 
Russo-  the  time  of  the  Crimean  War,  so  now  the  mission- 

Turkish  aries  could  only  marvel  and  give  thanks  that  their 
War  work  was  little  interrupted.     Touring  was  somewhat 

disturbed,  but  in  the  larger  centers  all  kinds  of  mission  activity 
were  maintained.  Not  directly  traceable  to  this  war,  though 
due  in  part  perhaps  to  the  disorders  following  it,  came  two 
significant  events  in  the  mission's  history.  One  was  the 
killing  of  Dr.  J.  W.  Parsons  and  his  faithful  attendant  as  they 
were  on  tour  among  the  villages  of  Nicomedea.  The  mur- 
derers belonged  to  a  roving  band  of  Turkomans,  whose  motive 
was  simply  robbery.  The  prompt  action  on  the  part  of  the 
authorities  and  the  arrest  and  punishment  of  the  robbers 
furnished  a  wholesome  warning,  and  made  more  safe  there- 
after missionary  journeys  through  the  regions  infested  by 
Kurdish  bands. 

Another  exciting  event,  though  of  different  character,  belong- 
ing to  this  time,  was  the  saving  of  Zeitoon  through  the  effort 
of  missionaries  of  the  Board.  This  city  of  Zeitoon,  among 
the  wild  peaks  of  the  upper  Taurus  mountains,  had  been  so 
long  oppressed  by  the  Turks  that  at  last  a  hundred  of  its  men 
formed  themselves  into  a  band  of  highwaymen.  Presently 
they  returned  and  captured  their  own  city,  robbed  the  treasury, 
and  drove  out  the  officials.  Troops  at  Marash  were  waiting 
for  the  order  to  destroy  the  town,  when,  upon  the  request  of 
the  English  consul.  Rev.  Henry  Harden  ventured  to  go  to 
Zeitoon  to  confer  with  the  outlaws  in  possession  of  it.  The 
record  of  that  heroic  embassage  makes  one  of  the  most  thrill- 
ing stories  of  adventure  to  be  found  anywhere  in  missionary 
annals.  Its  incidents  include  the  hazard  of  the  climb  up  to 
the  town,  when  rifles  often  gleamed  from  behind  projecting 
rocks;  the  days  of  conference  over  the  outlaws'  stories  of 
wrongs,  ending  in  the  formulation  of  terms  of  surrender;  the 
return  to  Marash,  and  the  effort  to  get  the  officials  to  accept 


226  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

a  peaceful  settlement;  the  swift  ride  of  Mr.  Christie  to  Aleppo 
over  130  miles  of  rough  and  dangerous  road;  the  orders  sent 
back,  dismissing  officials  and  appointing  a  new  governor, 
accepting  the  terms  and  thanking  the  missionary  for  his  ser- 
vice. And  when  the  new  governor  set  out  for  Zeitoon,  it  was 
to  Mr.  Marden  that  he  came  for  a  letter  of  introduction  to 
the  people  there,  while  in  the  settlement  of  the  troubles  the 
missionaries  served  still  further  as  intermediaries  and  as  mar- 
shals to  control  the  city.  It  was  not  strange  that  the  rough 
men  of  Zeitoon  were  eager  thereafter  to  sit  at  Mr.  Marden' s 
feet  as  he  preached  to  them,  or  that  at  Marash  the  following 
year  there  was  experienced  a  gracious  revival  that  brought 
hundreds  into  the  new  life. 

The  years  1850-1880  marked  a  rich  accomplishment  for 
the  Board  in  Turkey:  the  establishment  of  great  missionary 
An  centers,    of   strong   and   aggressive   churches,    of   a 

Eventful  trained  and  efficient  ministry;  the  renewal  and 
Period  development  of  an  educational  system  abreast  of 

the  expanding  needs;  work  for  women  elevated  into  a  well- 
ordered  and  vigorous  department;  the  Scriptures  distributed 
over  the  empire  in  all  the  great  languages  of  the  people,  and 
immensely  increased  influence  of  the  American  mission  and 
missionary  among  all  classes  of  people.  When,  by  the  treaty 
of  Berlin,  following  the  Russo-Turkish  war,  an  edict  was 
issued  which  assured  absolute  and  unequivocal  religious  liberty 
to  all  in  the  empire,  upon  the  ''voluntary"  assurance  of  the 
Sublime  Porte,  and  when,  at  the  same  time,  with  the  sanction 
of  the  great  powers,  a  form  of  British  oversight  was  provided 
for  Asia  Minor,  it  seemed  that  a  brighter  day  had  dawned  for 
the  missions  in  the  Ottoman  empire. 


Chapter  XII 

IN  MICRONESIA 

The  transformation  of  the  Sandwich  Islands  from  a  land  of 
savages  to  an  ordered  nation  was  now  accomplished.  In  1851 
The  New  there  assembled  at  Honolulu  the  first  house  of 
Era  in  the  representatives,  regularly  chosen  by  ballot  at  the 
Sandwich  polls;  in  the  same  year  substantial  court-houses  and 
Islands  prisons  were  begun;  land  titles  were  protected  by 
a  commission;  the  machinery  of  a  civilized  and  free  state  was 
in  operation. 

The  school  system  was  developed  and  adequate;  15,000 
pupils  were  now  enrolled  in  over  500  schools,  four-fifths  of 
them  Protestant.  The  annual  expenditure  for  schools  was 
$43,000;  three-quarters  of  the  cost  being  met  by  the  govern- 
ment through  a  labor  tax. 

One-fourth  part  of  the  nation  was  in  the  membership  of 
the  mission  churches;  1600  persons  were  added  during  1852 
on  confession  of  faith.  The  gifts  of  the  people  for  their  own 
religious  institutions  were  steadily  increasing;  the  native 
church  was  assuming  responsibility  under  the  lead  of  the 
growing  native  pastorate;  the  proposal  of  a  missionary  work 
beyond  these  islands  that  should  stir  a  nobler  motive  even 
than  self-help  was  being  welcomed  with  enthusiasm.  The 
missionaries  were  only  exercising  oversight,  with  but  partial 
and  decreasing  rehance  on  the  Board's  aid. 

The  distinctly  foreign  missionary  period  in  the  Sandwich 
Islands  had  passed.  Already  at  one-third  of  the  stations  the 
work  was  really  on  a  home  missionary  basis;  what  remained 
to  be  done  was  only  what  is  required  in  newer  or  less  self- 

227 


228  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

reliant  fields  of  Christian  work  in  this  country.     Yet  the  diffi- 
culties in  the  way  of  the  Board's  withdrawal  were  more  than 

at  first  anticipated.  While  a  transformation  had  been 
wthd^  °      wrought,  which  was  in  some  respects  little  short  of 

miraculous,  so  that  in  1854  the  missionaries  could 
declare  that  in  no  part  of  the  world  were  life  and  property 
safer  than  in  the  islands,  and  that  murders,  robberies,  and 
the  higher  felonies  were  unknown,  a  characteristic  indolence 
and  softness  of  will  inclined  the  Sandwich  Islander  to  flinch 
before  the  demand  of  constant  responsibilities  and  duties.  It 
began  to  be  felt  that  the  education  which  had  been  given  to 
him  had  been  too  strictly  religious,  or  at  least  intellectual; 
that  there  had  been  too  little  training  to  fit  him  for  the  develop- 
ment of  his  life  in  a  land  where  the  pressure  of  home  and  social 
standards  did  not  drive  to  work.  An  occasional  recrudescence 
of  heathenism  also  made  the  missionaries  halt  in  their  plans 
for  withdrawal,  as  when  there  came  on  Oahu,  in  1858,  a  revival 
of  the  hula,  the  old  lascivious  dance,  which  had  been  stamped 
out  for  a  generation. 

The  death  of  Kamehameha  III,  in  1854,  was  a  blow  to  mis- 
sion interests,  as  the  reign  of  his  successor  proved  reactionary 
and  hurtful.  Soon  it  looked  as  though  the  government  was 
digging  the  grave  of  the  nation.  Other  adversities  came,  in 
an  epidemic  of  smallpox,  in  1855,  which  took  500  members, 
one-fifth  of  the  whole  number,  from  the  First  Church  in  Hono- 
lulu, and  400,  one-third  of  the  membership,  from  the  Second 
Church,  and  in  the  appearance  in  the  islands  of  a  new  disease, 
Chinese  leprosy,  for  which  no  cure  could  be  found.  Contact 
with  the  outside  world,  it  seemed,  was  bound  to  kill  off  the 
Hawaiian  race.  The  missionaries  were  comforted  to  think 
that  they  were  in  no  wise  responsible  for  these  adversities; 
the  depopulation  of  the  islands  had  indeed  been  stayed  by 
the  coming  of  the  gospel;  the  loss  of  sixty-five  per  cent  in  the 
forty-four  years  preceding  1823  had  been  reduced  to  about 
seven  per  cent  in  the  seven  years  before  1860.     Yet  the  dimin- 


IN  MICRONESIA  229 

ishing  of  the  native  population  was  another  check  on  the  inde- 
pendence of  native  Christianity  in  the  islands. 

It  was  not  until  June,  1863,  when  Secretary  Anderson  visited 
the  islands  and  met  with  the  Hawaiian  Evangelical  Associa- 
Withdrawal  tion,  that  the  closing  of  the  American  Board's 
at  Last,  mission  was  accomplished.  The  time  was  fortunate 
1863  for  ^Y^Q  action  in  that  another  revival  of  religion 

had  brought  into  the  churches  1500  new  members,  lifted  the 
gifts  of  the  people  to  $21,000,  and  quickened  all  the  life  of 
churches  and  schools.  After  three  weeks  of  conference  over 
plans,  there  was  unanimous  agreement  in  the  result:  the  Board 
was  to  take  full  care  of  its  surviving  missionaries;  the  Asso- 
ciation was  to  be  responsible  for  home  evangelizat.on  and  for 
the  main  care  of  the  new  Micronesian  Mission;  some  grants- 
in-aid  as  needed  were  for  a  time  to  be  made  to  the  Association 
by  the  Board. 

The  third  mission  organized  by  the  American  Board  was 
thus  judged  to  have  completed  its  task  in  forty-three  years. 
The  year  following  there  died  one  of  the  Hawaiian  youths  who 
had  wandered  with  Obookiah  to  this  country,  and  who  had 
returned  with  the  first  missionaries.  In  his  lifetime  and  before 
his  eyes  had  been  wrought  such  a  revolution  as  no  man  would 
have  believed  possible  who  had  seen  those  islands  in  the  day 
when  the  youth  fled  from  the  horror  of  them.  Wonder  and 
gratitude  over  what  had  been  accomplished  were  felt  by  every 
fair-minded  observer.  The  Hawaiian  Gazette,  organ  of  the 
government,  chance  visitors  to  the  islands  like  Richard  H. 
Dana,  Esq.,  who  wrote  of  them  in  his  famous  Two  Years 
Before  the  Mast,  some  commanders  of  United  States  ships 
that  entered  the  ports,  representatives  of  other  missionary 
societies  who  came  to  study  this  field,  all  gave  unsolicited 
testimony  as  to  the  marvel  they  found. 

One  very  timely  and  valued  utterance  of  this  sort  came 
in  the  early  '60s,  when  representatives  of  the  Church  of 
England  endeavored  to  establish  in  the  islands  what    they 


230  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

called  the  ''Reformed  Catholic  Mission,"  and,  in  their  zeal, 
assailed  the  work  of  the  American  Board  with  an  attack  so 
bitter  and  persistent  as  to  be  a  serious  embarrassment.  Just 
then  Rev.  William  Ellis  of  the  Church  Missionary  Society, 
who,  it  will  be  remembered,  happily  associated  himself  with 
the  pioneer  missionaries  on  the  islands,  of  his  own  accord, 
from  love  of  truth  and  justice,  published  The  American  Mis- 
sion in  the  Sandwich  Islands :  a  Vindication  and  an  Appeal, 
a  defense  which  proved  so  complete  and  unanswerable  as  to 
cause  the  collapse  of  the  projected  mission.  The  testimony 
of  another  visitor  had  the  weight  of  an  impartial  judgment. 
''Fifty  years  ago,"  said  Dr.  Andrew  P.  Peabody,  voicing  his 
impression  of  what  he  had  seen,  "the  half-reasoning  elephant 
or  the  troth-keeping  dog  might  have  seemed  the  peer,  or  more, 
of  the  unreasoning  and  conscienceless  Hawaiian.  From  that 
very  race,  from  that  very  generation,  with  which  the  nobler 
brutes  might  have  scorned  to  claim  kindred,  have  been  devel- 
oped the  peers  of  saints  and  angels." 

The  brightest  evidence  of  the  transformation  wrought  in 
the  Hawaiians  by  the  gospel  was  the  zeal  which  they  showed 
^jjg  in   undertaking   to   evangelize   other   people.     The 

Mission  story  of  their  mission  to  the  Marquesas  Islands  is 
to  the  from  beginning  to  end  full  of  romance.     The  call 

Marquesas  to  it  came  in  the  sudden  appearance  of  a  Marquesan 
Islands  chief,  with  his  Hawaiian  son-in-law,  asking  for  mis- 
sionaries. The  islands  for  which  they  pleaded  were  a  long 
way  off  and  their  people  were  notoriously  fierce.  Of  fine 
physique,  they  were  yet  among  the  lowest  savages,  hideously 
tattooed,  perpetually  fighting,  recognizing  no  law  save  their 
cruel  tabus,  gloating  over  their  cannibal  feasts.  Yet  more 
Christian  Hawaiians  than  could  be  accepted  offered  themselves 
as  missionaries  to  this  forbidding  people. 

When  the  first  curiosity  over  their  arrival  was  satisfied, 
these  devoted  Hawaiian  Christians  had  to  face  persecution  and 
the  long,  slow  pull  of  mission  work  in  a  savage  land.     They 


IN   MICRONESIA  231 

were  constantly  forced  to  witness  bloody  scenes,  and  to  dwell 
in  the  midst  of  horrid  vices  and  crimes.  Yet,  with  patience 
and  persistence  unnatural  to  their  race,  they  held  on  until 
at  length  they  won  regard  and  influence.  Slowly  the  system 
of  tabiis  was  broken  down,  thieving  was  checked,  and  their 
own  lives  and  property  were  protected  even  in  times  of  violence. 
The  mate  of  an  American  ship,  as  he  landed  on  one  of  the 
islands,  was  seized  and  about  to  be  killed  and  eaten,  when  one 
of  these  Hawaiians,  Kekela,  at  the  risk  of  his  own  life,  inter- 
fered and  succeeded  in  persuading  the  chief  to  release  him; 
for  which  act  of  life-saving  President  Lincoln,  as  he  heard  of 
it,  wrote  a  letter  of  thanks  to  the  brave  missionary. 

The  record  of  this  Marquesan  Mission  is  not  strictly  a  part 
of  the  American  Board's  history;  but  as  parents  count  their 
children's  affairs  as  their  own,  it  is  hard  to  separate  it  from  the 
Board's  own  story.  As  representatives  like  Doctors  Gulick  and 
Coan  visited  the  Marquesas  Islands  to  see  how  the  work  was 
faring,  they  ever  returned  with  enthusiastic  reports  of  the 
skill,  faithfulness,  and  loving  devotion  of  the  Hawaiian  mis- 
sionaries. When  Secretary  Clark  visited  the  Sandwich  Islands, 
in  1870,  at  the  jubilee  of  the  introduction  of  Christianity,  he 
felt  that  the  most  impressive  moment  in  all  that  celebration 
was  when  the  work  of  this  foreign  mission  was  presented. 
"The  grandest  scene  of  all,  that  Jubilee  day,  was  the  veteran 
native  missionary  Kauwealoha,  returned  after  seventeen  years 
in  the  Marquesas  Islands,  where,  after  the  failure  of  English 
missionaries  and  American  missionaries,  he,  with  two  others, 
had  driven  down  their  stakes  and  stayed  on,  through  trials  and 
hardships,  till  he  could  report  four  churches  of  Christ  estab- 
lished, and  that  500  men  and  women  had  learned  to  read  the 
story  of  the  cross.  And  there,  on  that  15th  of  June,  standing 
up  in  the  presence  of  his  king,  foreign  diplomats,  old  mis- 
sionaries, and  that  great  assembly,  he  held  aloft  the  Hawaiian 
Bible,  saying,  'Not  with  powder  and  ball,  and  swords  and 
cannon,  but  with  this  loving  word  of  God,  and  with  His  spirit, 
do  we  go  forth  to  conquer  the  islands  for  Christ.'" 


232  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

The  Mission  to  Micronesia  was  begun  in  1852,  a  year  earlier 
than  that  to  the  Marquesas  Islands.  For  the  latter  the  Hawai- 
-pjjg  ian  Evangelical  Association  was  alone  responsible; 

Microne-  in  Micronesia  the  Association  and  the  American 
sian  Mis-  Board  cooperated.  The  2000  "httle  islands"  that 
sion,  1852  gQ  ^y  ^^Q  name  of  Micronesia  lie  about  the  equator 
and  west  of  180  degrees  from  Greenwich.  They  are  divided 
into  four  principal  groups,  the  Gilbert,  Marshall,  Caroline,  and 
Mariana  Islands,  into  all  of  which  mission  work  was  at  length 
extended.  As  the  nearest  of  them  are  2500  miles  southwest 
of  the  Sandwich  Islands,  and  as  they  stretch  2500  miles  from 
east  to  west,  it  was  no  small  enterprise  that  was  contemplated 
in  the  proposal  to  evangelize  these  neglected  fragments  of  the 
world.  But  the  first  venture  did  not  contemplate  the  entire 
task;  it  was  but  to  make  a  beginning  that  might  be  followed 
up  as  God  should  open  the  way. 

Three  men  with  their  wives  were  sent  from  the  United 
States  to  plant  the  mission:  Rev.  and  Mrs.  B.  G.  Snow,  and  Dr. 
The  First  and  Mrs.  L.  H.  Gulick  sailed  from  Boston  in  Novem- 
Mission-  ber,  1851;  Rev.  and  Mrs.  A.  A.  Sturges  followed 
aries Arrive  two  months  later.  When  the  missionaries  ques- 
tioned why  the  new  route  by  Panama  might  not  be  taken,  to 
lessen  time  and  hardship,  the  secretary's  sufficient  answer 
was,  "The  missionaries  to  Micronesia,  my  young  brother, 
need  the  discipline  of  a  voyage  round  the  Horn." 

Four  wearisome  months  brought  them  to  Honolulu,  where 
they  met  a  royal  welcome.  Thence,  with  two  native  mis- 
sionaries selected  from  those  who  had  offered  to  go,  they 
sailed  July  15  on  the  schooner  Caroline  for  their  unknown  home. 
After  sixteen  days  of  close  quarters,  seasickness,  and  hard 
work,  they  touched  at  Butaritari  in  the  Gilberts,  and  were 
kindly  received,  but  decided  to  push  on  600  miles  to  Kusaie, 
the  easternmost  of  the  Carolines.  Most  of  the  islands  of 
Micronesia  are  mere  coral  reefs,  rims  of  land  round  a  central 
lagoon,  with  one  or  more  passages  to  the  sea.     The  soil  is 


IN  MICRONESIA  233 

thin  and  barren,  though  covered  with  trees;  there  are  no  springs 
or  streams;  no  hills;  few  birds  and  flowers.  Beasts  cannot 
live  on  them,  and  their  human  inhabitants  maintain  a  meager 
existence  on  fish,  taro,  and  the  fruits  of  some  trees.  A  few 
of  the  Caroline  Islands,  notably  Kusaie  and  Ponape,  are  of 
basaltic  formation  and  richly  fertile.  Mountains  from  2000 
to  3000  feet  in  height  are  covered  with  forests,  from  which 
streams  flow  into  lovely  valleys;  tropical  fruits  and  vege- 
tables abound;  birds  and  flowers  are  everywhere. 

At  Kusaie,  also,  the  missionary  party  was  warmly  welcomed, 
the  high  chief  of  the  island  cordially  assenting  to  the  proposal 
that  some  of  the  missionaries  should  locate  there.  He  had 
picked  up  a  little  English  from  the  traders  whom  he  had  met, 
and  at  once  promised  to  be  ''all  same  father"  to  the  mission- 
aries. Clad  only  in  a  faded  flannel  shirt,  his  wife  beside  him  in  a 
short  cotton  gown,  he  seemed  a  humble  specimen  of  royalty;  yet 
he  had  the  love  and  respect  of  his  people,  who  approached  him  on 
hands  and  knees,  and  called  him  *'  good  King  George."  In  many 
ways  and  to  the  best  of  his  power  he  fulfilled  his  promise  of  aid. 

Leaving  the  Snows  and  one  of  the  Hawaiians  at  Kusaie,  the 
Caroline  sailed  300  miles  stiU  farther  west  to  Ponape,  a  high 
island  and  the  finest  in  Micronesia,  where  the  remainder  of 
the  party  found  the  way  unexpectedly  open  for  their  arrival. 
Three  years  later,  in  1855,  came  reenf orcements :  the  Doanes 
and  the  Piersons,  with  more  Hawaiian  preachers  and  their 
wives.  The  bark  that  brought  the  Piersons  down  touched 
both  at  the  Gilbert  and  the  Marshall  Islands,  and  some  acquaint- 
ances were  gained  that  afterward  led  to  extending  work  to  them. 

These  pioneer  missionaries  were  face  to  face  with  heathenism 
in  its  lowest  forms.  Conditions  were  not  the  same  on  all 
islands.  On  the  Carolines  there  were  better  houses; 
^^  ,  ^  °  the  Marshall  Islanders  were  better  clothed;  the 
Gilbertese  were  great  warriors.  Each  group  had 
its  own  language;  sometimes  a  single  island  like  Kusaie  had 
its  particular  speech,  spoken  nowhere  else. 


234  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

But  the  similarities  were  more  marked  than  the  differences, 
especially  in  character.  The  Micronesians  were  all  liars  and 
thieves.  They  were  in  the  main  approachable  and  friendly; 
markedly  kind  to  strangers;  at  the  same  time  cruel  and  revenge- 
ful by  nature  and  sly  in  their  petty  thefts.  Their  religious 
ideas,  though  varying  in  different  sections,  were  vague  and 
superstitious;  they  had  no  formed  idols,  but  set  up  stones  in 
honor  of  spirits,  with  whom  they  sought  to  communicate. 
To  them  the  air  was  swarming  with  these  spirits,  who  returned 
to  the  earth  in  human  form  and  wrought  injury.  Their  gods 
were  not  loved  or  esteemed,  only. dreaded;  all  they  asked  of 
them  was  to  be  let  alone. 

To  the  missionaries,  fresh  from  Christian  America,  the  look 
of  these  raw  heathen  was  appalling.  ''The  people  were  nearly 
naked,  sitting  or  lying  around  in  their  huts  or  in  the  sun, 
filthy  as  possible,  appearing  more  like  apes  than  human  beings. 
I  thought  I  was  prepared  for  all  the  hardships  I  should  meet, 
but  the  question  came  to  me  again  and  again,  'How  can  I 
endure  life  for  months  and  years  amid  such  surroundings  as 
these  ? '  And  my  heart  went  down,  down,  lower  than  my  boots, 
I  think!  But  I  wisely  kept  my  own  counsel,  and  put  on  as 
bold  a  front  as  my  companions." 

Before  the  new  mission  was  fairly  planted  there  befell  some 
unexpected  and  heavy  disasters.  In  1854  came  a  violent 
epidemic  of  smallpox.  Brought  to  Ponape  by  a 
ffindran  vessel  whose  sick  were  put  on  shore,  it  was  spread 
by  the  ignorant  natives,  who  stole  the  foreigners' 
clothes.  The  ravage  was  terrific;  half  of  the  tribe  of  2000 
perished.  When  some  of  Dr.  Gulick's  patients  died,  beach 
combers  prejudiced  the  natives  with  slanders  about  the  mis- 
sionaries. A  temporary  loss  of  confidence  followed,  which 
added  to  the  gloom  of  the  time.  At  length  inoculation  tri- 
umphed; after  four  months  the  scourge  was  stayed  and  the 
missionaries  regained  favor. 

Scarcely  had  the  smallpox  passed  when  a  fire  at  Ponape 


IN  MICRONESIA  235 

destroyed  Mr.  Sturges'  house  and  all  its  contents,  and  com- 
pelled him  and  his  family  to  take  to  the  woods  for  shelter. 
Next,  war  broke  out  between  tribes,  and  robberies,  murders, 
and  general  recklessness  prevailed.  The  enmity  of  evil- 
minded  white  men  who  were  preying  on  the  credulous  natives 
was  an  increasing  hindrance.  Brothels  kept  by  foreigners  were 
an  open  affront  and  challenge.  Sabbath  services  were  once 
disturbed  by  a  company  of  men  with  loaded  muskets, 
who  were  trying  to  recapture  some  girls  that  had  escaped 
from  one  of  these  establishments. 

On  Kusaie  the  untimely  death  of  Mr.  Snow's  Hawaiian 
associate  brought  sorrow  and  added  care.  The  strain  of  new 
and  arduous  labors  under  such  oppressive  conditions  wore 
upon  the  poor  missionaries,  who  at  times  were  almost  dis- 
tracted with  the  conflicting  calls  and  the  burden  of  providing 
for  their  own  families. 

Still  gains  were  made.  Native  superstitions  were  gradually 
broken;  the  evil  influence  of  depraved  foreigners  was  waning 
Progress,  among  the  better  disposed  natives.  As  the  fear 
Notwith-  of  the  island  gods  was  cast  off,  there  was  some 
standing  increase  of  recklessness  and  violence,  but  it  was 
felt  that  this  only  marked  a  transition  period.  A  thirst  for 
education  was  awakened  which  gave  impetus  to  the  schools. 
Even  the  chief  officer  of  the  king  of  Ponape  set  out  to  learn 
to  read;  "the  cooper  should  teach  him  how,  or  he  would  pound 
him."  All  the  zeal  for  schools,  however,  was  not  from  the 
purest  motive.  Some  of  the  scholars  would  sit  patiently  for 
six  hours  to  get  a  chance  to  steal.  At  Kusaie  Mr.  Snow  had 
a  home  built  for  him  by  the  king,  who,  with  his  chiefs,  was  a 
good  listener  at  the  services.  The  Sabbath  was  regularly 
observed  and  schools  were  opened  that  met  with  great  success 
in  teaching  English. 

The  isolation  of  the  early  missionaries  to  Micronesia  was 
intense.  For  months  together  they  would  go  without  any 
news  from  abroad;  then  it  would  be  only  a  whale  ship  that 


236  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

would  put  in,  and  perhaps  with  all  on  board  indifferent  or 
hostile  to  the  missionary.  Mr.  Snow  waited  two  years  for  the 
The  home  letters  that  told   of  his  mother's  death.     As 

Morning  they  scanned  the  sea  in  vain,  weary  men  and  women 
Star  felt  a  depression  of  spirits  such  as  castaways  know. 

Without  the  upward  look  of  faith  and  the  hand  busy  at  its 
loved  task  they  could  not  have  endured  the  loneliness  of 
their  lot. 

For  the  better  protection  of  the  missionaries  as  well  as  their 
comfort,  and  to  make  possible  the  extending  of  the  mission 
into  the  other  groups,  there  was  need  of  a  missionary  ship. 
So  the  appeal  went  forth  for  the  Morning  Star;  the  children 
of  the  churches  and  Sunday-schools  were  asked  to  provide 
for  her  cost,  about  $12,000.  The  money  was  soon  raised,  the 
"children's  ship"  was  quickly  built,  and  she  sailed  from  Boston 
December  2,  1856.  A  farewell  meeting  for  Mr.  and  Mrs. 
Hiram  Bingham,  Jr.,  the  new  missionaries  she  was  to  take 
out,  and  attended  also  by  her  captain  and  crew,  had  filled 
Park  Street  Church,  Boston,  and  many  friends  visited  the 
packet  on  the  cold  first  day  of  winter  to  bid  Godspeed  to  the 
"Peacemaker,"  as  the  Kusaiean  natives  called  the  Star. 
After  a  prosperous  voyage  of  twenty-one  weeks  the  vessel 
arrived  at  Honolulu,  and  over  her  and  the  missionary  whom 
she  brought  back  to  his  boyhood  home  there  was  great 
rejoicing. 

It  was  September  8  when  the  Star  at  last  dropped  anchor 
in  the  harbor  of  Kusaie,  and  never  was  the  arrival  of  a  ship 
more  opportune.  A  rebellion  had  turned  the  island  into  a 
battle-field  and  put  the  missionaries  in  danger;  moreover,  they 
were  short  of  provisions  and  in  destitute  case.  "Our  day 
began  to  dawn,"  they  said,  "when  the  Morning  Star  first 
gladdened  our  horizon."  Taking  the  Snows  on  board,  the 
vessel  sailed  on  to  Ponape  for  a  mission  meeting.  Here,  too, 
they  found  the  missionaries  reduced  to  a  starvation  diet,  and 
the  men  compelled  to  look  after  all  the  outdoor  work  as  well 


SOME    OF   THE   AMERICAN    BOARD    SHIPS 

1  HIRAM  BINGHAM    II  4    MORNING    STAR    II 

2  MORNING  STAR  I  5   MISSIONARY  PACKET  (carried  first 

3  MORNING  STARS  IV  (sttU  and  missionaries  to  Sandwich  Islands) 
steam)  and  v  (steamer) 


IN  MICRONESIA  237 

as  to  help  in  the  kitchen  and  at  the  wash-tub;  accounting  it 
part  of  their  ministry  thus  to  set  a  good  example  to  the  lazy 
natives  whom  they  could  not  yet  persuade  to  work. 

At  this  mission  meeting  it  was  determined  to  begin  work  at 
once  in  the  Marshalls  and  Gilberts;  the  Piersons  and  Doanes 
Plans  for  being  assigned  to  the  former,  the  Binghams  and 
Enlarge-  Kanoa,  the  Hawaiian,  to  the  latter.  As  the  Morning 
°^®^t  Star,    conveying    these    missionaries    to    their    new 

homes,  approached  Ebon,  in  the  Marshalls,  and  a  fleet  of  seven- 
teen boats  shot  out  from  the  lagoon,  boarding  nets  were  put 
up  as  a  precaution.  But  when  Dr.  Pierson  called  to  them,  a 
man  in  the  first  canoe  cried  out  joyfully,  ''Doketur,  Doketur!" 
He  proved  to  be  one  of  a  party  of  Marshall  Islanders  whose 
boat  had  drifted  to  Kusaie  a  year  before,  where  he  had  come 
to  know  the  mission.  Dr.  Pierson's  announcement  that  some 
of  the  party  were  soon  coming  to  be  missionaries  at  Ebon  was 
hailed  with  delight.  The  head  chief  assured  them  protection, 
gave  them  a  choice  of  location,  native  help  in  building  their 
house,  and  warned  all  not  to  molest  them.  Despite  the  repu- 
tation of  these  islanders  as  treacherous  and  savage,  so  that  white 
men  for  a  long  while  dared  not  live  among  them,  the  mission- 
aries settled  down  without  fear  and  in  joy  to  their  task.  They 
suffered  many  annoyances,  but  no  injury  save  petty  thefts. 

At  Apaiang  in  the  Gilberts  the  missionaries  met  a  similar 
welcome.  This  island,  like  Ebon,  was  low  and  barren;  the 
reef  at  its  highest  part  was  only  a  few  feet  above  the  ocean 
and  on  the  average  less  than  quarter  of  a  mile  in  width.  But 
as  it  enclosed  a  lagoon  fifty  miles  in  circumference,  there  was 
something  of  a  "field." 

The  missionaries  left  in  these  new  groups  must  have  felt  a 
pang  of  homesickness  as  they  watched  the  Star  sail  away. 
Breaking  But  they  settled  to  their  task  at  once,  learning  the 
Ground  language,  getting  hold  of  the  people,  exploring  their 
islands,  and,  so  soon  as  they  could  make  themselves  understood, 
beginning  to  declare  the  gospel.     The  Hawaiians  made  good 


238  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

missionaries.  The  languages  were  not  difficult  for  them,  espe- 
cially the  Gilbertese.  Within  six  months  missionary  work  was 
under  way. 

There  were  plenty  of  hardships  and  difficulties  in  those 
early  experiences.  It  was  hard  to  get  proper  food  on  the  low 
islands;  sometimes  even  fish  was  scarce.  Supplies  sent 
out  to  them  were  occasionally  ruined  in  transit;  once,  as  the 
flour  was  spoiled,  they  were  without  bread  for  a  year.  Hardest 
of  all  it  was  when  the  Gilbert  missionaries  learned  that  their 
long  awaited  mail  had  been  left  by  a  passing  schooner  at  one 
of  the  islands,  only  to  be  eaten  by  the  natives,  who  supposed 
it  was  a  new  kind  of  white  people's  food. 

It  was  not  easy  to  conduct  a  service  even  if  one  knew  the 
language  and  had  secured  a  congregation.  Mr.  Bingham's 
account  of  experiences  in  his  early  touring  suggests  the  patience 
and  tact  that  were  required.  ''As  we  close  our  eyes  for  prayer, 
one  and  another  shout  to  those  near  them,  'Matu,  matu!' 
(Go  to  sleep,  go  to  sleep!)  meaning,  'Shut  your  eyes.'  After 
a  general  commotion,  in  which  some  bow  their  faces  to  the 
ground,  the  prayer  is  offered.  At  its  close,  as  the  missionary 
opens  his  eyes,  a  number  begin  to  shout,  'Uti,  uti!'  (Wake  up, 
wake  up!)  and,  with  a  burst  of  laughter,  these  rude  worshipers 
sit  up  again.  I  begin  to  preach.  But  the  leading  man  of 
the  village  may  break  in  upon  me,  by  asking  if  I  will  not  take 
a  pipe.  'I  never  smoke,'  is  the  answer.  Next  he  may  offer 
me  some  molasses  and  water  to  drink,  or  the  milk  of  a  green 
cocoanut.  Sometimes  we  tell  them  that  we  have  not  come 
to  eat  and  drink,  but  to  teach  them.  It  is  often  better,  how- 
ever, to  stop  preaching,  and  drink  from  the  cocoanut,  and  then 
go  on  again.  After  service  we  often  look  up  the  blind  and 
sick  of  the  village,  and  teach  them  in  their  own  houses." 

So  in  these  islands,  also,  as  before  in  the  Carolines,  in  the 
midst  of  barbarous  customs,  coarse  vices,  riotings,  and  even 
wars,  in  which  sometimes  women  fought  with  men,  the  stead- 
fast missionaries  kept  at  their  work,  declaring  a  better  way  and 


IN  MICRONESIA  239 

trying  to  win  the  people  to  it.  And  gains  were  made.  Schools 
were  soon  going  and  a  thirst  for  education  developed.  At 
The  Seed  Ebon,  about  1860,  Mr.  Doane  found  an  astonish- 
Taking  ing  eagerness  to  learn.  Out  of  school  hours  there 
Root  was  almost  as  much  study  as  during  the  session, 

and  the  children's  play  even  into  the  moonlit  evenings  was 
writing  on  the  sand.  The  missionary's  house  was  thronged 
with  eager  learners;  the  Httle  printing  office,  also;  and  in  the 
boats  men  were  spelling  words  or  repeating  pages  of  what 
they  had  read.  Signs  of  religious  interest  and  the  beginnings 
of  an  ingathering  were  recognized  at  Ebon. 

At  Apaiang,  one  June  night  of  1859,  the  people  broke  off 
from  its  foundation  in  the  center  of  their  village  the  great 
stone  which  symbolized  the  chief  deity  of  the  Gilberts,  and 
rolled  it  into  the  lagoon,  clearing  away  also  the  platform  on 
which  votive  offerings  were  placed.  This  same  year,  with 
the  consent  of  the  king,  a  chapel  was  built  and  in  March  the 
first  Christian  sanctuary  of  the  Gilberts  opened  its  doors  for 
worship.  Here,  too,  the  printing  press  was  an  important  factor. 
Within  five  years  of  his  arrival  Mr.  Bingham  had  ready  for 
publication  a  Gilbertese  version  of  the  Gospel  of  Matthew 
and  a  small  hymn  book.  Soon  after,  the  Star  brought  down 
a  printing  press;  the  first  printer  was  a  castaway  sailor  who 
drifted  to  Apaiang. 

Meanwhile,  at  the  older  stations  in  the  Carolines  there  was 
corresponding  progress.  In  1860,  after  eight  years  of  waiting, 
three  converts  were  received  at  Ponape;  soon  there 
p     ..  were  eight  more;  a  second  church  of  six  members 

started  in  another  part  of  the  island.  Church 
buildings  were  now  erected,  one  of  considerable  size  at  the 
station,  and  a  chapel  back  in  the  mountains.  Mr.  Sturges, 
returning  from  a  land  tour  over  Ponape,  was  surprised  to  find 
how  the  light  was  spreading  quite  around  the  island.  The 
most  apt  to  teach  among  the  church  members  had  been  sent 
out  far  and  wide  to  spend  a  Sabbath,  or  a  few  days,  in  holding 


240  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

meetings  and  teaching  from  house  to  house.  The  return  of 
these  deputations  with  their  reports  encouraged  the  mother 
church  to  renewed  prayer  and  effort. 

At  Kusaie  it  was  a  cheering  day  in  1861  when,  as  a  ship 
was  wrecked,  Christian  natives  went  with  their  missionary  to 
her  aid,  one  swimming  off  to  her  with  a  hne,  by  means  of 
which  all  on  board  were  saved.  In  former  times  all  who 
escaped  the  sea  would  have  been  murdered.  A  few  years 
later,  at  Ponape,  a  yet  more  eloquent  testimony  was  borne, 
when  a  pirate  vessel  destroyed  four  whale  ships,  first  giving 
them  over  to  the  natives  for  plunder;  even  with  so  great  a 
temptation,  but  few  of  the  church  members  were  induced  to 
share  in  the  spoils. 

A  heavy  blow  came  to  the  missionaries  in  1862  with  the 
intimation  that,  under  the  pressure  for  retrenchment  occa- 
Enduring  sioned  by  the  Civil  War,  the  Board  was  considering 
Heavy  the  withdrawal  of  the  Morning  Star,  and  even  the 

Trials  closing    of    the    Ponape    station.     Their    protests 

reveal  their  devotion  to  these  poor  islanders.  How  could  they 
get  along  without  the  Star,  their  one  link  with  the  world? 
Yet,  if  the  vessel  must  be  given  up,  let  it  not  be  assumed  that 
they  must  withdraw  and  if  the  Board  could  not  provide  their 
support  longer,  they  would  ask  the  privilege  of  seeking  some 
way  to  maintain  themselves  rather  than  desert  the  islands. 
As  to  the  suggestion  that  in  the  Marshalls  and  Carolines  the 
native  Christians  might  carry  a  larger  part  of  the  work,  the 
Committee  were  expecting  too  much.  ''The  prospect  is  more 
than  fair,"  wrote  Mr.  Snow,  "that  we  shall  have  a  bow-legged 
mission,  and  one  half-crippled  through  life,  if  you  insist  on 
throwing  us  too  early  on  our  own  understandings."  Happily 
the  necessity  for  such  a  hazardous  experiment  was  escaped. 

Another  trial  for  the  Ponape  missionaries  came  in  the  burn- 
ing of  the  church  in  1865.  At  the  close  of  one  of  the  happiest 
Sabbaths  they  had  ever  known  at  the  island,  when  chiefs  never 
seen  before  at  a  service  had  been  in  the  large  congregation, 


IN  MICRONESIA  241 

suddenly  the  drunken  chief  officer  of  the  king,  with  a  crazed 
mob  at  his  heels,  rushed  from  the  woods  and  set  a  torch  to  the 
thatch.  In  a  few  moments  the  labor  of  months  was  destroyed. 
But  even  this  cloud  had  a  silver  lining.  Eighteen  large  canoes 
from  all  parts  of  the  island  soon  brought  100  loyal  men  to 
guard  the  missionary.  ''After  two  nights  of  suspense,"  he 
wrote,  ''surrounded  by  howling  savages,  it  was  good  to  grasp 
the  hand  of  love,  and  see  the  sympathy  and  resolve  beaming 
in  so  many  faces,  even  if  these  were  the  faces  of  heathen." 

Mr.  Bingham  writes,  in  1863,  from  Apaiang  of  a  sky  full  of 
clouds.  "Our  two  converts  have  gone  back  to  heathenism, 
others  for  whom  we  entertained  great  hope  have  grown  cold, 
and  there  is  not  a  native  of  Apaiang  or  Tarawa  upon  whom 
we  may  look  as  a  friend  of  Jesus."  The  king  remained  friendly 
and  regularly  attended  service;  but  on  the  whole,  there  seemed 
to  be  decline.  It  was  still  the  time  for  patient  seed-sowing. 
*'We  need  most  emphatically,"  said  the  lonely  toiler  in  that 
hard  field,  "touring  missionaries  —  men  of  much  physical 
endurance;  able  and  willing  to  live  much  on  what  the  islands 
produce;  to  sleep  night  after  night  on  the  ground;  to  drink 
miserable  water;  to  row  or  paddle  many  a  weary  mile  to  wind- 
ward, with  no  native  to  help;  to  walk  long  distances  on  wide, 
glaring  flats,  beneath  a  torrid  sun,  after  they  have  left  their 
boat,  before  they  can  preach  to  the  natives.  Such  must  be 
much  of  the  experience  of  missionaries  to  the  Gilbert  islands. 
But  thanks  be  to  God,  our  Hawaiian  missionaries  do  engage 
to  some  extent  in  this  work." 

On  the  whole,  there  was  advance;  the  missionaries  recognized 

it;  it  was  conspicuous  to  visitors.     Rev.  J.  S.  Emerson  went 

down  to  Micronesia  with  the  Star  in  1865,  as  repre- 
Still 
Ad  ance       sentative  of  the  Hawaiian  Evangelical  Association, 

to  inspect  all  the  stations  of  the  mission.     The  first 

stop  was  at  Tarawa,  one  of  the  Gilberts,  where  the  work  of 

two   Hawaiian  missionaries,  who  had  been  there  about  five 

years,  won  the  visitor's  admiration.     At   Ebon,   also,  in  the 


242  STORY   OF  THE   AMERICAN   BOARD 

Marshalls,  he  marveled  at  what  had  been  wrought:  the  decent 
behavior  of  the  people;  the  prosperous  schools;  the  church 
gathered  out  of  wild  savages.  Portions  of  the  Scriptures, 
besides  hymn  books,  primers,  and  other  books,  were  now 
available  in  all  the  four  languages  of  these  groups.  At  Ponape 
in  the  Carolines  more  than  200  persons  were  now  openly  on 
the  Lord's  side;  one  native  tribe  had  abandoned  heathenism 
to  become  "missionary."  In  1867,  at  one  of  the  churches, 
built  on  the  very  spot  where  in  1853  Mr.  Sturges  just  escaped 
being  assaulted  and  robbed,  100  communicants  partook  of  the 
Lord's  Supper,  while  600  Ponapeans  looked  on.  The  congre- 
gations were  always  most  attentive;  as  one  visitor  said,  ''they 
gulped  it  down."  At  Kusaie  there  was  a  Sabbath-school  of 
118  pupils  of  all  ages,  and  groups  of  eager  Christians  spent 
quiet  evenings  working  at  the  Gospel  of  Matthew  or  the  new 
hymn  book  which  the  Star  had  just  brought  them. 

After  ten  years'  service  in  these  tropic  seas,  the  Morning  Star 
was  so  worn  that  it  seemed  best  to  dispose  of  her  and  to  get  a 
Other  new  vessel.     In  1866  a  new  ''children's  ship"   was 

"Morning  built,  bearing  the  same  loved  name  and  commis- 
Stars  sioned  to  the  same  work.     Two  thousand  Sunday- 

schools  contributed;  with  individual  gifts,  $28,700  was  raised 
for  the  new  vessel.  It  was  planned  that  Mr.  Bingham,  whose 
prolonged  ill  health  forbade  his  continuing  to  dwell  in  the 
Gilberts,  and  who  commanded  the  new  vessel  on  her  voyage 
out,  should  keep  the  command  and  so  be  able  to  bring  the 
benefit  of  his  cheer  and  wise  counsel  to  all  the  stations  of 
Micronesia.  But  in  1868  the  state  of  his  health  compelled  a 
change  in  the  plan  and  a  new  captain  was  found  for  the  Star. 
Dr.  Bingham  was  thenceforth  to  reside  at  Honolulu,  if  possible 
making  a  yearly  trip  to  the  Gilberts,  but  devoting  the  rest 
of  his. time  to  his  preeminent  work  of  translating  the  Bible  in 
Gilbertese  and  of  providing  all  the  language  aids  for  its  study. 
Two  and  a  half  years  later,  as  the  Morning  Star  was  leaving 
Kusaie  for  Honolulu,  a  squall  carried  her  broadside  on  a  reef 


IN  MICRONESIA  243 

and  she  was  wrecked.  Dismayed  by  this  sudden  and  per- 
plexing disaster,  the  Board  delayed  for  some  time  the  venture 
of  another  ship.  But  the  situation  of  the  island  missionaries 
and  their  work  compelled  some  provision  for  their  need.  A 
third  Morning  Star,  paid  for  in  part  by  insurance  on  No.  II 
and  in  part  by  fresh  contributions  from  the  children,  was 
built  in  1871.  How  glad  a  sight  she  was  as  she  came  into 
Ponape  harbor  on  September  13  may  be  imagined  from  the 
fact  that  Mr.  Doane  had  been  for  a  year  the  only  American 
missionary  in  all  Micronesia,  and  that  the  new  vessel  brought 
not  only  his  wife,  but  other  missionaries  returning  from  fur- 
lough, with  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Whitney  as  reenf  or  cements. 

The  decade  beginning  with  1870  found  some  of  the  native 
Christians  really  prepared  to  do  effective  work  in  opening  and 
Progress  maintaining  new  fields,  and  the  missionary  spirit 
in  the  was    growing.     Moreover,    the    Hawaiian    mission- 

'70s  aries  were  becoming  more  experienced  and  more 

devoted.  Butaritari  in  the  Gilberts,  which,  with  Jaluit  in 
the  Marshalls,  was  occupied  by  Hawaiian  missionaries  in 
1865,  by  1871  showed  a  wonderful  change.  At  first  it  had 
been  very  dark  and  discouraging;  three  Hawaiians  had  been 
killed  by  the  king;  the  missionaries  were  forced  to  flee  from 
the  island;  the  people  seemed  completely  demoralized.  Now 
it  was  the  brightest  part  of  the  Gilbert  field.  The  king's 
brother,  sister,  and  sister-in-law  were  members  of  the  church, 
and  the  king  no  longer  opposed.  The  church  had  doubled  its 
membership  within  a  year.  Some  of  the  more  prominent 
members  were  in  training  to  become  teachers. 

In  1871  effort  was  made  to  place  Ponapean  teachers  on 
Mokil  and  Pingelap,  two  neighboring  islands  of  the  Carolines. 
At  Mokil  they  were  received,  but  the  king  of  Pingelap,  bribed 
by  vicious  white  men,  would  not  let  them  land.  However, 
two  Pingelap  natives,  who  had  strayed  away  to  Ponape  and 
there  studied  for  some  months  with  the  missionaries,  went 
back  to  their   islands  as  Christians  and  took  advantage  of 


244  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

their  high  rank  and  influence  to  set  up  a  school  and  teach 
Christ.  The  effect  was  tremendous;  the  people  cast  away 
their  idols,  built  the  largest  church  in  Micronesia,  formed  new 
villages  round  the  church  and  schoolhouse,  and  when  Mr. 
Sturges  visited  the  island,  in  1873,  he  received  a  veritable 
ovation. 

After  this  visit  to  Pingelap  the  missionaries  placed  on  the 
Mortlocks,  a  small  group  of  the  Caroline  Islands,  300  miles 
southwest  of  Ponape,  three  couples  of  native  Ponapeans  who 
had  offered  themselves  for  this  foreign  mission.  One  of  them 
was  the  princess  Opatinia  and  her  husband  Opataia,  whose 
high  character  and  service  had  made  their  names  glorious 
among  the  Micronesian  churches.  In  thus  leaving  their 
homes  and  the  privileges  belonging  to  their  rank,  to  dwell 
among  strange  and  it  might  be  hostile  peoples,  that  they 
might  preach  Christ  to  those  who  knew  him  not,  these  dusky 
missionaries  certainly  stood  the  full  test  of  Christian  heroism. 

This  same  year,   1873,  marked  the  coming  of  age  of  this 
mission;   twenty-one  years   before   the  first  missionaries  had 
landed  on  Kusaie  and  Ponape.     As  Mr.  Snow  and 
,  .  Mr.   Sturges  recalled   days  of  beginnings  and  the 

obstacles  then  in  their  way,  higher  and  more  solid, 
as  they  seemed,  than  the  mountains  above  their  heads,  they 
looked  about  them  now  with  joy  and  praise  at  the  wonder 
of  the  accomplishment :  three  groups  of  islands  occupied ; 
2,500,000  pages  of  Scriptures  and  text-books  provided  in 
four  dialects,  reduced  to  written  languages;  a  training-school 
for  pastors  and  teachers  in  each  of  the  three  groups,  and  com- 
mon schools  on  every  island  touched;  twenty  churches,  with 
1000  members;  home  and  foreign  missions  undertaken,  with 
gifts  at  the  monthly  missionary  concerts  of  $1000,  and  the 
sending  forth  of  ten  chosen  representatives;  native  preachers 
and  teachers  setting  some  fine  examples  to  their  flocks;  and 
beyond  all  figures  or  exact  measurements,  a  new  ideal  of  life 
set  forth,  before  which  the  old  pagan  rites  and  superstitions 


IN  MICRONESIA  245 

were  yielding  ground  and  a  better  civilization  taking  their 
place. 

The  feature  of  special  interest  and  encouragement  in  these 
days  was  the  efficiency  of  the  native  leaders.     The  work  in  the 
Mortlocks  was  altogether  in  their  hands   and  was 
T  ^  \^^  being  pushed  with  admirable  zeal  and  wisdom.     In 

one  year  the  Ponapeans  were  found  to  have  learned 
their  new  language,  built  meeting-houses,  and  won  congrega- 
tions. As  Opataia,  and  Opatinia,  ''looking  every  bit  a  queen," 
entertained  them  in  a  well-ordered  home,  it  seemed  to  the 
missionaries  as  if  they  must  be  dreaming.  Three  churches 
were  organized  in  the  Mortlocks  in  1875,  and  four  more  in 
1876,  with  nearly  300  members  in  all,  of  whom  a  good  report 
could  be  given.  Eight  more  churches  were  organized  among 
the  islands  in  the  following  year  and  over  500  members  added. 

The  zeal  of  these  young  native  evangelists  in  pressing  on  to 
new  fields,  and  the  spirit  of  self-denial  and  sacrifice  with  which 
those  to  whom  they  brought  the  light  suffered  them  to  move 
on  to  the  peoples  still  sitting  in  darkness,  were  alike  inspiring. 
At  Oniop,  one  of  the  Mortlocks,  the  infant  church  that  had 
had  its  teachers  but  one  year,  and  then  only  as  they  had  fol- 
lowed the  Star  day  after  day  in  their  canoes,  pleading  that 
they  be  not  passed  by,  let  them  go  in  1877  to  answer  an  urgent 
call  from  islands  beyond.  At  first  they  were  not  willing,  but, 
after  long  discussion  and  a  night  of  prayer,  they  held  a  morning 
meeting  by  themselves,  from  which  they  sent  this  answer  to  the 
waiting  missionary:  ''Are  the  teachers  ours  that  we  should  hold 
on  to  them  ?  They  belong  to  Jesus;  if  he  wants  them  we  would 
not  keep  them."  Similar  scenes  were  enacted  the  following 
year,  when  the  Star,  then  under  command  of  Captain  Isaiah 
Bray,  visited  twenty-five  islands,  to  be  welcomed  with  up- 
stretched  hands  as  a  pledge  of  protection  and  support. 

But  even  in  these  years  of  more  rapid  growth  it  was  not  all 
bright  in  the  island  work.  While  there  were  such  shining 
examples   of   transformed   character    and   a   widespread  dis- 


246  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

position  to   follow  the   new   and   better  way,  there  was   yet 

the  heavy  drag  of  heathenism  and  the  besetting  sins  of  the 

tropics.     It  was  not  possible  that  those  who   had 

a  ows  i^gygj.  recognized  any  moral  law  or  practised  self-con- 
trol, save  under  physical  fear,  should  conform  their 
lives  at  once  and  without  a  fall  to  the  Christian  standards  of 
love  and  purity.  It  is  not  surprising,  then,  that  mingled  with 
reports  of  gains  .and  encouragements,  and  inspiring  stories  of 
Christian  loyalty,  should  be  tidings  of  another  sort,  of  painful 
reverses,  lapses  into  heathenism,  gross  sins  of  church  members, 
and  even  of  Christian  teachers,  of  islands  and  stations  where 
work  seemed  to  be  for  a  time  at  a  standstill  or  even  slipping 
back. 

The  Gilbert  Islands  were  for  long  the  most  disheartening 
field,  with  their  rank  heathenism,  the  bloody  quarrels  of  their 
chiefs,  and  their  indifferent  or  defiant  attitude  to  the  gospel. 
So  late  as  1879,  on  Tarawa,  a  year  in  which  there  was  no  white 
missionary  in  the  Gilberts,  one  of  the  four  church  members 
being  slain  in  battle  was  actually  eaten  by  the  savages,  and 
the  head  of  another  Christian,  known  as  King  David,  was  cut 
off  and  carried  away  for  the  sake  of  the  teeth,  to  be  used  for 
neck  ornaments. 

The  year  1877  was  marked  in  the  Carolines  by  the  opening 
of  a  new  station  at  Truk,  an  archipelago  of  high  islands  about 
Pushing  in  the  center  of  the  group,  but  farther  west  than 
to  West-  any  point  yet  occupied,  and  having  one  of  the  largest 
ward  lagoons  in  all  Micronesia.     It  was  approached  with 

some  hesitation  as  the  inhabitants,  though  of  superior  build 
and  capacity,  were  supposed  to  be  specially  savage. 

No  canoes  came  out  to  meet  the  missionary  party,  but  as 
they  entered  the  cove  they  saw  the  islanders  gathered  before 
their  feast  house,  watching  the  landing.  When  Mr.  Logan 
stood  up  and  called  the  Mortlock  salutation,  the  company 
rushed  down  into  the  water,  and,  seizing  the  loaded  boat, 
carried  it  to  dry  land.     Mr.  Sturges'  description  of  what  fol- 


IN  MICRONESIA  247 

lowed  gives  a  vivid  picture  of  what  missionary  pioneering 
involved  in  the  Micronesia  of  that  day.  "The  king  came  for- 
ward and,  on  being  introduced  to  the  captain,  took  him  and 
the  missionary,  and  led  the  way  up  the  slope  and  into  the 
great  house  and,  pointing  to  the  platform  on  a  big  canoe, 
asked  his  guests  to  be  seated.  The  crowds  rushed  in  and 
largely  filled  up  the  house.  After  a  few  moments  the  king 
brought  with  his  own  hands  a  wooden  tray,  filled  with  what 
looked  like  frosted  dumplings,  and  placed  it  before  us.  I  was 
not  slow  to  get  out  my  pocket-knife  and  appropriate  to  myself 
one  of  these  very  inviting  (breadfruit)  dumplings.  There  was 
nothing  to  excite  our  fears,  except  that  I  had  noticed  on  land- 
ing some  few  of  the  natives  holding  big  knives  in  their  hands, 
not  grasping  them  as  if  for  use,  but  merely  holding  them  after 
the  Ponape  fashion,  so  I  did  not  dread  them.  Still  it  was  a 
relief  to  have  the  food  so  quickly  brought,  and  the  leaders 
on  both  sides  partaking  of  a  friendly  meal  together,  as,  on 
all  these  islands,  to  partake  of  food  together  is  to  be  friends. 

''The  crowd  being  called  to  order,  perfect  silence  prevailed, 
and  the  great  object  of  our  coming  was  introduced.  After  a 
few  words  of  explanation  the  question  was  put,  'Do  you  want 
the  teachers  we  have  brought  for  you  to  stop  on  your  island  ?  ^ 
The  king  and  the  chiefs  answered  in  the  affirmative." 

A  site  was  afterward  selected  for  a  station,  and  after  full 
explanations  the  king  and  queen  and  people  promised  to  love 
and  care  for  Moses  and  Zipporah,  the  Ponapean  teachers  who 
were  to  be  left  on  the  island.  Though  a  Ponapean  by  training, 
Moses  was  by  race  a  Gilbert  Islander,  born  on  a  canoe  that 
had  drifted  out  to  sea;  his  first  cradle  thus  suggested  his  name. 
The  service  of  these  two  noble  souls  in  the  far  island  to  which 
they  thus  committed  their  lives  entitles  them  to  high  place 
in  the  roll  of  missionary  heroes. 

After  leaving  Truk,  the  Star  sailed  to  the  Mortlocks  and  there 
left  the  Logans.  Rev.  Robert  W.  Logan,  who  had  come  to 
Micronesia  in  1874,  and  whose  missionary  career,  though  not 


248  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

long,  has  caused  his  name  to  be  cherished  with  special  love  and 
reverence  in  the  islands,  had  visited  the  Mortlocks  two  years 
The  Logans  before.  So  impressed  was  he  with  the  need  of  a 
on  the  leader  in  that  field  that  on  his  return  to   Ponape 

Mortlocks  he  began  the  study  of  the  Mortlock  speech.  At 
length,  with  his  brave  wife  he  was  left  on  the  remote  and 
desolate  low  island  of  Oniop.  At  first  they  lived  in  a  trader's 
hut;  the  people  stole  their  goods  and  threatened  their  lives; 
when  the  goods  were  almost  gone,  the  chief  put  the  tahu  on 
the  foreigners:  no  one  could  sell  or  give  them  anything  that 
the  island  afforded.  Mr.  Logan  was  of  frail  physique  and 
fell  sick  under  the  privations.  At  length  the  last  flour  was 
used,  the  last  loaf  was  half  eaten.  In  that  desperate  hour  a 
trading  vessel  touched  at  the  island.  After  a  voyage  of  eleven 
weeks,  with  no  shelter  but  a  temporary  cabin  on  deck,  so  low 
that  they  crawled  into  it  on  hands  and  knees,  and  through 
whose  light  thatch  both  sun  and  rain  beat  on  them,  they 
entered  a  New  Zealand  port.  When  at  last  they  reached 
America,  and  were  somewhat  restored  to  health,  Mr.  Logan 
disclaimed  any  heroism  in  his  missionary  life.  '^ Sacrifices?  I 
do  not  know  that  I  have  ever  made  any  great  sacrifices." 
Of  such  stuff  were  the  men  and  women  of  the  Micronesian 
Mission;  in  labors,  self-devotion,  and  persistence  they  sur- 
passed the  coral  insects  who  formed  the  islands. 

Questions  of  the  relocation  of  missionaries  were  rising  in 
the  mission  in  the  late  '70s,  as  it  was  felt  by  many  that 
Readjust-  the  low  islands  were  not  healthful  and  safe  resi- 
ments  by  dences  for  foreigners.  There  were  two  minds  about 
Experience  [^  then,  and  have  been  ever  since,  but  it  was  at 
length  decided  at  the  mission  meeting  of  1880  that  Kusaie 
should  be  made  the  center  for  the  work  in  the  Gilberts  and 
Marshalls,  and  Ponape  for  that  in  the  Carolines.  It  was  also 
felt  that  the  high  island  of  Truk  should  be  occupied  by  Ameri- 
can missionaries.  The  training-schools  for  the  Marshall  and 
Gilbert  Islands  were  now  transferred  to  Kusaie,  and  it  became 


IN  MICRONESIA  249 

part  of  the  work  of  the  Morning  Star  to  carry  to  and  fro  the 
pupils  selected  for  this  higher  education.  At  the  same  time 
the  purpose  of  these  schools  to  prepare  teachers  and  preachers 
of  the  gospel  was  yet  more  clearly  defined.  A  few  years  earlier, 
Dr.  C.  M.  Hyde  had  been  sent  by  the  Board  to  Honolulu  to 
take  charge  of  the  North  Pacific  Institute,  there  to  train  mis- 
sionaries and  a  native  ministry  for  Micronesia.  Thus  at  the 
close  of  this  period  the  mission  was  rearranging  its  plans  and 
force  for  larger  dependence  on  the  native  church  and  the  native 
ministry  in  the  winning  to  Christ  of  two  thousand  islands, 
not  one  of  which  was  yet  thirty  years  out  of  savagery. 


Chapter  XIII 
IN  THE  EMPIRE  OF  CHINA 

The  China  of  1850  had  opened  a  few  ports  to  the  foreigner, 
but  she  was  hardly  cordial  to  his  presence.  The  missionaries 
The  Door  found  utmost  difficulty  in  locating  in  Foochow  city. 
Opens  A  district  magistrate  hindered  Mr.  Peet  from  rent- 

Hard  ing  a  room  for  a  street  chapel    and   Mr.  Richards 

from  securing  a  building  lot  in  the  eastern  suburbs;  in  the 
same  way  he  shut  them  off  in  another  quarter.  When,  at 
length,  a  lot  was  secured,  the  neighbors  rose  in  opposition. 
They  treated  the  missionaries  abusively,  tore  down  official 
notices  forbidding  persecution,  and  put  up  inflammatory 
posters  instead.  But  the  government  issued  another  proc- 
lamation recognizing  the  right  of  missionaries  to  pursue  their 
work,  and  threatening  with  severe  punishment  all  who  abused 
them;  whereupon  the  tumult  subsided  as  quickly  as  it  arose. 

The  northern  part  of  the  empire  was  at  this  time  in  the 
first  shock  of  the  portentous  T'ai  P'ing  rebellion,  and  terror 
A  Dis-  and  disorder  filled  the  land.     With  its  astounding 

turbed  religious  origin  and  its  early  superficial  association 

Country  with  missionary  work,  this  outbreak  was  not  unnat- 
urally watched  with  anxiety  by  the  missionaries.  Fortunately 
it  did  not  spread  far  enough  to  the  south  to  touch  the  Board's 
fields. 

The  capture  of  Amoy  by  insurgents  in  1853,  with  its  conse- 
quent siege  by  the  imperial  forces,  though  merely  a  local  dis- 
turbance, was  of  greater  immediate  effect  upon  the  Board's 
work.  During  the  two  and  a  half  months  that  the  siege  lasted 
there  was  almost  daily  fighting  and  the  mission  residences, 
being  on  the  water  side,  were  directly  in  the  path  of  the  missiles. 

250 


IN  THE   EMPIRE  OF  CHINA  251 

All  of  them  were  perforated  by  cannon  balls.  Mr.  Doty's 
house,  after  the  sharpest  naval  engagement,  showed  the  marks 
of  about  a  hundred  balls  of  various  sizes;  the  roof  was  fairly 
ripped  up.  Yet  all  the  missionaries  escaped  harm  and  there 
was  no  serious  loss  of  property. 

It  was  a  remarkable  incident  of  the  siege  that  many  of  the 
insurgents,  while  they  were  captors  of  the  city,  resorted  to 
the  Christian  chapels.  Hundreds  if  not  thousands  were  thus 
brought  into  contact  with  Christianity  who  might  never  have 
learned  of  it  otherwise.  On  the  whole,  the  missionaries  in 
Amoy  regarded  1856  as  the  best  year  yet  in  China,  with  evi- 
dences of  a  genuine  religious  interest  which  increased  the  year 
following,  till  all  the  time  and  strength  of  the  workers  were 
absorbed  in  holding  services,  meeting  inquirers  and  candidates 
for  church  membership. 

Far  more  care,  it  was  felt,  was  exercised  in  the  examination 
of  these  candidates  than  was  customary  in  the  homeland,  and 
far  greater  confidence  was  justified  in  the  genuineness  of  their 
conversion.  Mr.  Doty  was  enthusiastic  over  their  zeal  and 
fidelity.  The  native  workers  were  his  pride.  '^  There  is  not 
one  of  our  native  assistants,"  he  says,  "who  makes  money  by 
connection  with  us.  Several  of  them  renounced  situations  of 
considerably  larger  incomes,  willingly  receiving  a  small  living 
allowance  for  the  sake  of  usefulness  among  their  perishing 
countrymen." 

The  Amoy  Church  was  now  more  fully  organized,  with  the 
choice  of  deacons  and  elders;  in  every  way  it  was  a  vigorous 
mission  which  was  transferred  to  the  Board  of  the  Reformed 
Church  in  America  when  the  separation  occurred  in  1857. 

For  some  time  the  American  Board  had  meditated  a  station 
Shanghai  at  Shanghai.  This  city  offered  a  location  farther 
Opened,  north  than  had  yet  been  attained;  it  was  one 
^^54  step  nearer  to  the  challenging  imperial  province  of 

Chi-li.  Shanghai  was  already  occupied  by  other  missions,  but 
the  open  ports  were  yet  few,  and  there  seemed  room  enough 


252  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

for  all  in  those  swarming  plains  of  Kiang-su.  As  they  watched 
the  multitudes  in  this  province,  the  missionaries  recalled  Dr. 
Poor's  saying,  ''The  human  race  is  in  the  East." 

Even  while  the  T'ai  P'ing  mobs  were  spreading  desolation 
over  the  region,  Mr.  Bridgman  had  been  busy  at  Shanghai 
in  translating  the  Scriptures  and  his  wife  had  started  a  board- 
ing-school there.  With  the  recapture  of  the  city  from  the 
vandals  (here,  also,  there  was  a  marvelous  escape  of  missionaries 
and  mission  property  from  the  general  slaughter),  the  way 
was  opened  for  the  entrance  of  missionaries,  and  in  1854 
Messrs.  Aitchison  and  Blodget  were  designated  to  join  Mr. 
Bridgman. 

Judging  that  the  city  crowds  could  be  sufficiently  cared  for 
by  the  twenty  missionaries  already  on  the  ground,  the  new- 
comers soon  transferred  their  residence  from  a  house  to  a 
boat,  and  thenceforth,  for  a  while,  gave  themselves  largely 
to  touring  among  the  dozen  walled  cities  and  almost  innumer- 
able towns  and  villages  which  they  regarded  as  their  parish. 
The  accommodations  of  the  boat  were  not  spacious;  a  cabin, 
nine  feet  by  seven,  served  as  parlor,  dining-room,  and  chamber 
for  both.  A  Chinese  teacher,  servant,  and  four  boatmen 
completed  the  party;  where  they  stowed  themselves  at  night 
was  a  mystery. 

Passing  slowly  along  from  place  to  place,  with  a  week  or  a 
month's  stay  in  each,  as  seemed  to  be  required,  these  devoted 
men  proclaimed  the  gospel  round  and  round  their  district. 
Their  appearance  on  the  streets  of  one  of  these  towns  was 
sure  to  draw  a  crowd;  boys  ran  before  them  shouting,  ''The 
barbarians  are  come,"  or,  "Ya  Soo!  Ya  Soo!  (Jesus,  Jesus)." 
Stopping  in  front  of  some  temple,  and  using  a  step  as  a  pulpit, 
the  missionaries  would  address  the  rabble  hemming  them  in 
on  all  sides.  The  majority  paid  respectful  attention;  they 
seemed  to  enjoy  any  keen  thrust  at  the  impotence  of  their 
idols.  Occasionally  a  nutshell  would  be  tossed  from  behind; 
but   once   were   stones   thrown.     Sometimes    a  rowdy  would 


IN  THE  EMPIRE  OF   CHINA  253 

break  in  with  noisy  comment  on  the  foreigners'  dress;  when 
opportunity  was  given  for  questions,  frivolous  inquiries  were 
pretty  sure  to  come  from  the  onlookers.  Toward  evening,  as 
their  presence  in  the  town  was  known,  the  missionaries  received 
calls  from  respectable  people,  who  would  pretend  at  least  to 
seek  information  as  to  Christianity,  though  their  real  motive 
was  plain  curiosity.  There  was  little  open  opposition  and  a 
wide  field  to  evangelize. 

China's  epochal  war  with  England  and  France  grew  slowly 
out  of  a  trivial  incident  at  Canton,  in  1856,  that  involved  the 
capture  of  the  city  the  year  following.     This  year 
Closed  ^^  ^^^^  ^^^  ^^^^  compelled  the  missionaries  to  leave 

Canton  and  take  up  temporary  residence  at  Macao; 
it  wrought  havoc  with  mission  property  and  interests.  Resi- 
dences were  destroyed  by  fire  or  looted,  the  chapel  was  ruined, 
the  printing  establishment  consumed.  This  last  was  the 
heaviest  loss  of  all,  carrying  with  it  several  presses  and  valuable 
fonts  of  Roman,  Chinese,  Manchu,  and  Japanese  type,  besides 
Mr.  Williams'  collection  of  7000  Chinese  works,  text-books  and 
reference  books,  many  of  which  were  never  reprinted.  The 
outlook  was  dark  indeed;  the  people  of  Canton,  incensed  at 
England's  action  in  the  matter,  were  bitterly  antagonistic 
to  foreigners;  the  government  was  weak;  rebellion  and  dis- 
order were  rife;  it  looked  as  though  the  return  to  Canton  was 
to  be  indefinitely  delayed. 

The  burden  on  the  mission  was  increased  by  the  resignation 
of  Mr.  Williams  to  accept  the  post  of  secretary  to  the  United 
States  Legation.  His  withdrawal  was  not  through  lessening  of 
interest  or  faith  in  missionary  work,  but,  as  he  felt,  to  meet 
a  special  need  of  the  time,  in  which  he  could  also  serve 
the  missionary  cause;  he  desired  it  should  be  looked  upon  as 
only  "si  temporary  interruption  of  a  relation  which  has  many 
probabilities  of  being  resumed." 

The  entrance  of  the  allied  armies  into  Peking,  the  destruc- 
tion of  the  summer  palace,  and  the  flight  of  the  emperor  to 


254  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

Tartary,  at  last,  in  1860,  opened  China  to  the  world.    The  treat- 
ies made  in  1858  with  four  great  powers  of  the  West  had  greatly 
enlarged  the  opportunities  and  privileges  of  foreign 
^  ^^\f-       merchants   in   the    empire;  to    foreign  missionaries 
'  they  brought  a  yet  greater  boon,  as  they  pledged 

toleration  to  Christianity  and  its  right  of  a  free  course  in  the 
land.  With  the  humbling  of  a  national  pride  built  largely 
upon  ignorance,  there  appeared  among  the  Chinese  a  deter- 
mination to  learn  the  secrets  of  the  Western  world,  the  fore- 
gleam  of  the  New  China  to  appear  in  the  next  generation. 
Looking  back  from  the  twentieth  century,  it  may  seem  a  very 
meager  and  incomplete  transformation  which  was  wrought  by 
the  treaty  of  Tientsin;  but  at  the  time  and  in  comparison  with 
previous  conditions,  it  appeared  to  the  eager  observers  nothing 
less  than  the  breaking  of  a  nation's  bonds.  At  the  annual 
meeting  of  the  American  Board,  in  1859,  the  first  news  telegram 
transmitted  by  the  Atlantic  cable  was  announced  amid  great 
enthusiasm,  ''The  Chinese  empire  is  to  be  open  to  aU  trade; 
the  Christian  religion  is  to  be  allowed  and  recognized;  foreign 
diplomatic  agents  are  to  be  admitted  to  the  empire." 

The  great  and  surprising  concessions  to  Christianity  which 
were  included  in  these  treaties  were  due  largely  to  the  good-will 
Christi-  ^^^  ability  of  United  States  Minister  Read,  Dr. 
anity's  S.  Wells  Williams,  then  secretary  of  the  Legation, 

Share  in  and  Rev.  W.  A.  P.  Martin.  That  the  assistance 
the  Change  ^^^  j^^^  ^jj  ^^  ^j^g  gj^jg  appears  in  a  speech  of  Min- 
ister Read,  replying  to  grateful  expressions  of  missionaries  in 
Shanghai.  After  calling  attention  to  the  fact  that  in  negotiating 
the  treaties  the  Imperial  Commissioners  of  their  own  accord 
offered  to  concede  to  the  missionaries  free  access  to  all  parts  of 
the  empire,  a  significant  concession  which  the  minister  could 
not  accept  for  the  sufficient  reason  that  it  would  involve  the 
distinction  of  classes  among  the  people  he  represented.  Minister 
Read  went  on  to  make  handsome  acknowledgment  of  the 
help  he  had  received  in  accomplishing  the  commercial  results  of 


IN  THE  EMPIRE  OF   CHINA  255 

his  mission:  ''In  my  despatches  homeward  I  have  spoken  of  my 
high  obhgations  to  the  American  missionaries  in  China,  with- 
out whose  practical  aid  I  could  have  done  little,  and  to  whose 
good  example,  making  a  deep  and  favorable  impression  on 
the  Chinese  mind,  what  is  called  diplomacy  owes  much.  The 
missionary  is  never,  by  his  own  act,  in  trouble  here.  He  is 
never  importunate  for  assistance,  or  clamorous  for  redress." 
That  these  words  were  not  ths  mere  compliment  of  a  graceful 
response  is  evident  from  the  ex-minister's  speech  to  the  mer- 
chants of  Philadelphia,  upon  his  return  to  the  United  States: 
*'I  went  to  the  East  with  no  enthusiasm  as  to  the  missionary 
enterprise.  I  come  back  with  a  fixed  conviction  that  in  this 
true  and  harmonizing  power,  and  in  its  increasing  influence 
on  commercial  adventure,  it  is,  under  Providence,  the  great 
agent  of  civilization;  and  I  feel  it  my  duty  to  add  that  every- 
where in  Asia  and  Africa,  among  the  Kaffirs  in  Natal,  on  the 
continent  of  India,  among  the  forests  of  Ceylon,  and  over  the 
vast  expanse  of  China,  the  testimony  to  the  suecess  and  zeal 
of  our  countrymen,  as  missionaries  of  truth,  is  earnest  and 
concurrent.     I  heard  it  everywhere,  and  from  high  authority." 

The  new  opportunity  of  Christianity  meant  a  larger  respon- 
sibility. In  affirming  his  conviction  that  nothing  in  the  modern 
The  Call  history  of  Asia  equaled  in  importance  the  accom- 
of  the  plishment   of  these  new  treaties   with   China,   Dr. 

Hour  Williams  urged  that  here  was  a  new  call  to  the 

churches.  It  was  likely  that  there  would  still  be  difficulty 
about  protection,  till  the  Chinese  realized  what  they  had  done. 
But  China  was  truly  opened;  not  less  than  100,000,000  of 
her  people  were  now  accessible.  It  was  the  time  to  press 
forward,  carefully,  patiently,  but  bravely  and  in  force. 

The  premonition  that  it  might  not  be  possible  to  make  an 
immediate  and  bold  advance  proved  warranted.  The  treaties, 
drawn  in  1858,  were  not  at  once  put  in  operation;  indeed, 
they  were  not  ratified,  as  agreed,  Avithin  a  year;  evasion  and 
delays  occurred,  fresh  hostilities  broke  out,  the  aUies  suffered 


256  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

reverses;  for  a  while  it  looked  as  though  hopes  were  once 
more  doomed  to  disappointment.  However,  the  occupation  of 
Peking  brought  the  Chinese  government  to  terms,  and  the 
treaty's  provisions  were  maintained. 

So  that  in  1860  the  American  Board  was  able  to  open  the 
long-desired  station  at  Tientsin;  two  years  later  Peking  was 
North  occupied;  the  Board  had  penetrated  at  last  to  the 

China  at  capital,  the  city  of  population,  wealth,  and  influence 
Last  for  the  vast  empire.     In  1865  a  station  was  begun 

at  Kalgan,  by  the  great  wall  on  the  northern  boundary  and 
looking  out  upon  Manchuria;  in  1867,  at  Tung-chou,  the  port 
and  granary  of  Peking,  and  six  years  later  at  Pao-ting-fu,  the 
capital  of  the  province.  The  choice  of  these  five  cities,  com- 
manding the  imperial  province  of  Chi-h,  was  due  largely  to 
the  judgment  of  Dr.  Blodget,  who  entered  Tientsin  with  the 
allied  armies,  went  with  them  to  Peking,  and  was  ever  alert  to 
seize  the  vantage  points  for  an  effective  evangelizing  of  the 
heart  of  China. 

The  burden  on  this  pioneer  missionary  was  crushing.  Dr. 
Bridgman's  death,  in  1862,  was  a  heavy  drain  on  the  slight 
force  trying  to  occupy  the  field.  '^I  marvel,"  writes  Dr. 
Blodget,  'Hhat  no  one  comes  to  join  me."  Yet  foundations 
were  laid  and  results  began  to  appear.  Four  converts  were 
soon  reported  (1862)  at  Tientsin,  men  of  position  and  literary 
teachers.  Unhappily  accessions  were  followed  quickly  by 
lapses,  and  some  of  the  early  additions  to  the  infant  church 
were  not  encouraging.  The  coming  of  Mr.  Hunt  from  Madras 
to  serve  as  printer  for  the  North  China  Mission  was  a  timely 
aid  in  the  hard  task  of  preparing  Christian  books  and  papers  in 
the  most  difficult  language  on  earth.  For  in  China,  also,  the 
missionaries  of  the  American  Board  were  from  the  beginning 
leaders  in  the  production  of  a  Christian  literature. 

Meanwhile  the  missions  left  in  the  southern  part  of  the 
empire  were  finding  their  path  somewhat  smoother.  In  gen- 
eral the   attitude   at   Canton  station  had  greatly  improved. 


IN  THE  EMPIRE  OF   CHINA  257 

Both  day  and  boarding  schools,  including  Mrs.  Bonney's  school 
for  girls,  were  prosperous;  attendance  at  services  was  growing. 
Mr.  Vrooman  found  100  to  150  assembling  at  his 
g     ,  chapel  for  the  tri-weekly  services;  the  prospects  were 

never  more  hopeful.  Yet  when  Mr.  Vrooman  was 
obliged  to  withdraw  because  of  his  wife's  health,  inasmuch  as 
other  missionary  societies  were  operating  at  this  center,  and  the 
opportunity  and  need  in  the  North  China  field  were  felt  to  be 
surpassingly  great,  the  Board  in  1866  decided  to  discontinue 
its  mission  at  Canton.  The  establishment  was  taken  over  by 
the  Presbyterians,  although,  as  mil  appear,  work  in  Canton 
was  resumed  by  the  American  Board  with  a  new  stimulus  and 
objective  in  1883. 

At  Foochow  the  good  effect  of  the  new  treaty  was  evident. 
People  were  readier  to  listen;  there  was  a  more  respectful  atti- 
tude toward  the  foreigner;  it  was  understood  that  chapels  and 
houses  could  now  be  rented  in  the  city  as  well  as  in  the  suburbs; 
church  members  and  native  workers  were  becoming  more 
useful.  Yet  hostilities  were  not  altogether  past.  In  the 
early  part  of  1864  rioting  against  Christians  was  renewed  in 
Foochow  city.  The  mob  spent  its  force  on  the  Methodist 
mission,  so  that,  though  the  American  Board's  chapel  was 
attacked,  it  was  not  badly  damaged.  Upon  restitution  by 
Chinese  officials  it  was  thought  there  would  be  no  more  such 
injury.  But  when,  in  1865,  a  site  was  purchased  for  a  larger 
and  better  city  chapel,  it  was  almost  as  hard  to  get  possession, 
despite  the  treaty,  as  it  was  to  get  the  first  little  chapel  seven 
years  before. 

However,  prejudice  was  lessening.  The  girls'  boarding-school 
at  Nantai  station,  established  in  1863  with  one  scholar,  the 
daughter  of  the  native  catechist,  was  at  first  looked  upon  with 
intense  suspicion.  People  feared  their  daughters  would  be 
carried  away  to  a  foreign  land,  or  converted  by  some  occult 
art  into  opium.  No  story  was  too  absurd  to  be  believed. 
Now,  only  five  years  later,  there  were  twenty  pupils;  more 


258  STORY   OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

applications  could  be  secured  than  could  be  met.  The  motive 
of  the  parents  still  was  not  encouraging,  less  a  desire  for  their 
daughters'  education  than  to  be  partly  relieved  of  the  burden 
of  their  support.  The  need  of  guarding  against  a  too  free 
school  became  apparent. 

In  these  days  the  work  of  the  China  missions  was  preemi- 
nently evangelistic.  The  era  of  institutional  enterprises  had 
Into  the  hardly  begun.  The  schools  and  the  press  were 
Interior,  both  in  the  preparatory  stage,  the  former  having  to 
^870  meet  the  immemorial  pride  of  the  Chinese  in  their 

own  educational  system.  Medical  missionaries  were  getting 
some  hold,  but  without  equipment  of  hospitals  and  dispensaries; 
the  first  missionary  physician  came  to  Foochow  in  1870.  The 
great  concern  then,  as  it  has  ever  been  a  characteristic  of  the 
missions  in  China,  was  street  and  chapel  preaching,  and  the 
following  up  of  openings  made  by  such  acquaintance. 

The  zeal  for  touring  was  now  quickened;  liberty  to  travel 
over  the  empire  brought  the  watchword,  "Push  into  the 
interior."  Tours  covering  hundreds  of  miles,  and  sometimes 
involving  absence  from  the  station  for  a  month  at  a  time,  were 
a  common  experience;  even  the  ladies  went  on  tour.  Every- 
where the  country  was  open,  the  climate  healthful,  the  people 
generally  kind  and  accessible;  there  was  always  the  motive 
of  curiosity  to  win  listeners.  The  closer  the  acquaintance 
with  the  people,  the  clearer  it  became  that  opium  was  blighting 
the  life  of  China,  dulling  minds,  searing  consciences,  entailing 
wealmess,  poverty,  disease.  All  ranks  and  all  ages  fell  victim. 
Even  Christian  disciples  and  sometimes  mission  helpers  were 
enticed  away  by  the  drug.  The  burden  of  this  national  vice 
and  menace  weighed  on  the  hearts  of  the  missionaries.  Some- 
thing must  be  done  particularly  to  meet  this  need,  if  missions 
were  to  adapt  themselves  to  the  situation  in  China.  The 
germ  of  opium  refuges  and  their  special  evangelism  was  in 
this  first  impulse  of  Christian  pity  for  the  wretched  slaves  of 
the  opium  pipe. 


IN  THE  EMPIRE  OF  CHINA  259 

Despite  the  new  times  and  the  growing  freedom  of  missionary 
activity,  there  were  occasional  disturbances  which  warned  the 
Fanatic  foreigner  to  go  carefully.  At  Tientsin,  in  June, 
Outbreaks  1870,  occurred  the  most  fiendish  attack  which  so 
Recur  far  had  been  made  upon   Europeans  by   Chinese. 

It  was  a  sudden  and  isolated  outbreak  directed  against  Roman- 
ists (no  missionaries  of  the  Board  suffered  personal  violence, 
though  for  a  time  their  lives  were  imperiled),  soon  over,  and 
at  once  denounced  by  the  officials,  who  sought  to  bring  the 
guilty  to  punishment.  But  it  seriously  interrupted  work  at 
Tientsin  and  Kalgan;  at  the  former  city  public  preaching 
was  suspended  for  several  months  and  the  freedom  of  the 
missionaries  was  much  restricted.  The  conduct  of  the  native 
Christians  during  this  trying  period  was  exceedingly  gratify- 
ing; not  one,  concerning  whose  sincerity  there  had  been  no 
suspicion  before,  proved  false  now  to  his  Master. 

At  Foochow  there  was  a  revival  of  anti-foreign  feeling  which 
provoked  alarm  and  some  injury.  Native  Christians  had  to 
sleep  by  wells  and  chapels  to  protect  them.  Strangers  found 
difficulty  in  passing  through  the  country  and  itinerating  and 
colportage  were  interrupted.  In  this  same  year,  1870,  at  a 
little  outstation  seventeen  miles  southwest  of  Foochow,  the 
chapel  was  raided  toward  the  close  of  morning  service.  The 
marauders  frankly  confessed  that  they  had  no  objection  to 
the  chapel  or  to  the  preaching  so  long  as  there  were  no  con- 
verts, but  now  that  some  young  men  were  accepting  Chris- 
tianity and  others  were  hesitating  whether  to  do  likewise, 
it  was  not  safe  to  tolerate  it  any  longer.  An  appeal  to  the  con- 
sul soon  brought  an  official  proclamation  sustaining  the  rights 
of  the  missionaries  and  forbidding  persecution;  the  question 
remained  whether  the  orders  would  be  obeyed.  The  policy 
of  the  government  was  indeed  changed;  not  so  surely  the 
prejudices  of  the  people,  whose  living  in  many  cases  would  be 
hurt  by  the  decline  of  idolatry. 

Yet  constant  gains  were  made;  the  stations  became  more 


260  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

firmly  established;  their  lines  of  work  broadened;  the  boys' 
boarding-school  at  Foochow  was  resumed  and  strengthened; 
Steady  the  one  for  girls,  started  so  modestly  in  1863,  was 
Gains,  now  a  substantial  institution  preparing  to  blossom 

1870-80  out  in  1881  as  the  ''American  Board  Female  Col- 
lege." Tours  up  the  Min  River  had  opened  a  permanent 
location  at  Shao-wu,  a  prefectural  city  in  an  isolated  mountain 
country,  250  miles  from  Foochow,  and  with  different  dialect, 
customs,  and  needs.  By  1877  two  missionaries  and  a  physician, 
with  their  wives,  were  located  at  this  station,  which  thus 
could  be  more  adequately  administered.  In  the  same  year 
the  beginning  of  a  native  pastorate  was  made  with  the  ordain- 
ing of  two  men  to  that  office.  The  issuing  of  an  alphabetical 
dictionary  in  Chinese  and  English,  in  which  Mr.  Baldwin 
assisted  Dr.  Maclay  of  the  Methodist  mission,  and  a  manual 
of  the  Chinese  language  in  the  Foochow  dialect,  the  work  of 
Mr.  and  Mrs.  Baldwin,  were  valued  aids  to  missionary  work 
that  enriched  the  '70s. 

In  North  China  attention  was  called  to  the  extent  and  value 
of  the  press  as  an  auxiliary  by  the  death  of  Mr.  Phineas  R. 
Hunt,  the  veteran  printer,  who  died  in  1878,  after  eight  years 
of  service  in  this  field,  and  as  he  was  preparing  to  return  to  his 
native  land.  The  several  stations  in  this  mission  were  develop- 
ing their  individual  character  and  lines  of  work.  Tung-chou 
early  indicated  its  educational  importance,  as  its  high  school 
attracted  to  it  selected  pupils  from  the  other  station  schools; 
thus,  by  1870,  a  beginning  was  made  of  the  higher  educational 
life  of  that  center.  Mr.  Blodget  noted  in  June  of  that  year 
that  as  he  went  to  Tung-chou  to  preach  for  Mr.  Sheffield,  the 
chapel  at  morning  service  was  filled  to  overflowing  with  lit- 
erary men  from  the  surrounding  region.  Gathered  at  Tung- 
chou  from  twenty-four  district  cities  for  a  public  examination, 
they  took  occasion  to  come  in  and  learn  of  the  new  doctrine, 
proving  attentive  observers  and  listeners.  This  was  fortunate 
ground  for  an  educational  mission. 


IN  THE  EMPIRE  OF  CHINA  261 

In  1878  the  northern  provinces  of  China  were  swept  by  a 
famine  so  fierce  and  appeahng  that  the  energies  of  the  mission- 
aries there  were  for  a  time  absorbed  in  ministering 

The  Door  ^.^  Messrs.  Stanley,  Smith,  Porter,  and  Sheffield 
of  Famine  '^ '  ' 

aided  18,000  persons  in  over  100  villages.     At  all 

stations  relief  was  received  and  dispensed.  Investigating 
needs,  succoring  the  famished,  caring  for  helpless  women  and 
children,  facing  the  masses  of  human  want  and  suffering,  the 
men  and  women  stuck  to  their  task  despite  the  heavy  drain 
on  body  and  heart.  It  proved  the  most  eventful  year  so  far; 
the  devoted  missionaries  had  their  reward  in  finding  among 
the  people  a  new  confidence,  gratitude,  and  willingness  to 
hear  the  gospel  of  hope. 

At  one  village,  a  few  miles  from  relief  headquarters,  the 
combined  sense  of  gratitude  for  the  missionary's  help  and  of 
disgust  at  the  failure  of  their  own  religion  to  help  in  the  hour 
of  need,  led  the  villagers  to  propose  that  they  should  cast 
out  the  gods  from  their  temple,  thus  to  testify  their  conviction 
that  Christianity  was  true.  After  prolonged  discussion  and 
counseling  with  prudent  fears,  they  decided  to  remove  the 
idols  into  the  front  building,  leaving  the  edifice  in  the  rear 
for  a  chapel.  The  ''dedication"  of  this  new  Christian  sanc- 
tuary is  thus  described:  ''On  the  20th  of  June  the  work  was 
completed  and  a  red  card  was  sent,  inviting  us  to  attend  the 
following  Sunday  and  hold  a  service  in  the  new  chapel,  as 
had  been  promised.  This  invitation  was  gladly  accepted,  and 
on  Sunday,  June  22,  one  of  the  missionaries  had  the  pleasure 
of  preaching  in  an  empty  temple  from  a  platform  once  used 
to  support  Buddhist  idols,  and  from  a  'desk'  which  two  days 
before  had  been  an  incense  table,  and  to  an  audience  of  respect- 
able size,  assembling  at  the  call  of  the  temple  bell,  vigorously 
beaten  by  the  son  of  the  temple  keeper.  Thus  this  build- 
ing was  formally  dedicated  to  God  when  as  yet  there  was 
not  only  no  church  to  worship  in  it,  but  no  baptized  person 
within  five   miles,    and  only   one  inquirer,  and  he  a  Taoist 


262  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

keeper  of  a  Buddhist  temple,  dependent  on  the  temple  for 
support." 

In  the  autumn  the  question  of  the  destruction  of  the  idols 
was  again  agitated.  The  growing  Christian  sentiment  was 
not  content  to  have  them  housed  anywhere  in  the  temple. 
Yet  ancient  fears  and  superstitions  were  strong.  There  was 
further  delay  and  questioning;  legal  difficulties  might  arise; 
it  was  a  new  and  dangerous  act.  At  length  it  was  decided 
to  make  the  venture.  A  solemn  feast  was  set  to  mark  the 
transfer  of  the  temple.  The  story  concludes:  ''A  formal  deed 
of  gift  was  drawn  up  and  read  to  the  meeting,  in  which  the 
temple  was  made  the  property  of  the  church,  and  its  land  was 
dedicated  to  the  support  of  the  temple  keeper,  who  now  becomes 
a  chapel  keeper.  The  formal  ratification  of  the  transaction 
was  no  sooner  complete  than,  at  dark  of  the  autumnal  day, 
fifteen  or  twenty  men  attacked  the  fifty  or  sixty  gods  crowded 
into  the  front  temple,  falling  upon  them,  as  the  Chaldeans  and 
the  Sabeans  fell  upon  the  flocks  and  herds  of  Job,  smiting 
them  with  the  edge  of  the  shovel  and  of  the  spade,  hurrying 
them  ingloriously  into  a  gutter,  so  that  at  midnight  not  one 
remained  alive !  The  next  Sunday  a  church  of  twelve  members 
was  organized  at  that  village,  several  of  those  baptized  being 
trustees  of  the  temple." 

So  the  period  closed  in  North  China  with  a  new  doorway 
opened  for  the  missionary  into  the  heart  of  its  people. 


Chapter  XIV 
IN  THE  EMPIRE  OF  JAPAN 

The  Missionary  Herald  for  March,   1828,  recorded  among 
the  donations  two  monthly  concert  collections  from  Brookline, 

Massachusetts,  amounting  to  $27.87,  ''for  mission 
of  Faith        ^^    Japan."     Similar    entries    appear    occasionally 

during  months  and  years  following.  This  solitary 
but  persistent  naming  of  Japan  as  a  missionary  field,  while 
yet  the  American  Board  had  no  mission  there  or  any  thought 
of  one,  and  while  that  nation  was  tightly  closed  to  all  foreign 
influences,  witnesses  to  the  faith  of  a  little  company  who  met 
in  the  home  of  William  Ropes  of  Brookline  to  pray  for  the 
conversion  of  the  world.  At  their  first  meeting  attention  was 
called  to  a  Japanese  basket,  which  was  one  of  the  ornaments 
of  the  room,  and  it  was  suggested  that  their  gifts  should  be 
designated  for  the  land  from  which  it  came.  Out  of  that 
meeting  grew  a  ladies'  sewing  society,  which  at  length  formed 
itself  into  a  missionary  society  for  Japan. 

Not  then,  however,  or  until  forty  years  afterward,  was  it 
possible  for  the  Board  to  undertake  any  work  in  that  island 

empire.  Christianity  had  been  brought  to  Japan 
Closed  ^^    ^^^    sixteenth    century    by    the  Jesuit,  Xavier. 

Welcomed  at  first  as  an  ally  against  the  Buddhists, 
it  was  soon  discarded  by  the  great  Hideyoshi,  who  became  the 
avowed  enemy  of  Christians  and  expelled  them  from  the 
island.  Those  who  would  not  leave  or  recant  were  put  to 
death  with  savage  tortures;  some  crucified,  others  torn  to 
pieces  by  oxen,  others  buried  alive.  Yet  multitudes  persisted 
in  their  faith  till,  in  1638,  upon  a  fruitless  revolt  against  their 

263 


264  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

oppressors,  37,000  were  massacred.  After  that  it  was  believed 
that  Christianity  had  been  exterminated  from  the  thought  of 
all  in  the  land,  save  a  few  scholars  in  Yedo,  who  were  set  to 
watch  for  its  reappearance.  Fierce  edicts  against  Christianity, 
the  exclusion  of  all  foreigners  except  the  Chinese  and  the 
Dutch,  who  denied  that  they  were  Christians,  the  forbidding 
of  the  Japanese  to  leave  their  own  country,  the  compelling 
of  all  suspects,  sometimes  whole  provinces  of  the  people,  to 
trample  upon  the  cross,  together  with  systematic  reports  from 
Buddhist  priests  as  to  any  taint  of  Christianity  in  their  terri- 
tory, were  some  of  the  means  used  to  protect  Japan  from  any 
further  contact  with  the  hated  religion  of  the  West. 

The  historic  visit  of  Commodore  Perry  with  his  warships  in 

1854  and  the  treaty  secured  in  1858  by  Hon.  Townsend  Harris 

opened  the  door  which  had  been  so  tightly  closed. 

T  e     oor     -^^  ^g^g  ^^^^  ports  were  declared  open  to  commerce, 

and   permanent   residence   and   several   missionary 

societies  had  their  representatives  on  the  ground. 

Not  until  ten  years  later,  in  1869,  did  the  American  Board 
venture  to  begin  its  work  in  Japan.  And  not  much  advance 
had  been  made  by  the  missionaries  on  the  field  during  that 
decade.  The  anti-Christian  edicts  were  still  in  force,  placards 
being  found  at  every  street  corner.  The  discovery  in  1865 
that  a  community  of  Catholic  Christians  in  villages  around 
Nagasaki,  with  no  priests  or  churches,  still  maintained  the 
faith  thus  handed  down  for  three  centuries  raised  a  new  alarm 
against  the  evil  sect  and  fresh  edicts  were  issued  against 
Christians.  The  government  defended  its  course  in  face  of 
the  treaties  by  declaring  that  the  torture  of  these  Christians 
was  but  a  question  of  internal  administration  which  concerned 
the  Japanese  alone. 

These  were  tumultuous  years  in  Japan;  there  was  no  security 
of  life  anywhere;  even  foreign  diplomats  were  assaulted  and 
assassinated;  all  foreigners  went  about  with  guards  to  defend 
them.     It  was  still   uncertain  whether  the  revolution  would 


IN  THE  EMPIRE  OF  JAPAN  265 

issue  in  any  stable  government.  The  American  Board  did 
well  to  bide  its  time.  But  by  1869  the  shogunate  was  deci- 
sively overthrown  and  peace  partially  restored.  The  time  had 
come  for  missionary  advance.  The  Board  determined  to 
begin  its  mission. 

The  $600  given  by  the  ladies  of  Brookline  had  now  'become 
$4000,  assigned  to  the  opening  of  this  new  work.  And  the 
Opening  first  missionary  to  be  sent  to  the  field  was  Rev. 
the  Mis-  Daniel  Crosby  Greene,  whose  father,  when  a  young 
sion,  1869  minister,  was  present  at  the  first  meeting  of  that 
Brookline  society.  Landing  at  Tokyo,  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Greene 
at  length  proceeded  to  Kobe,  then  little  more  than  a  fishing 
village,  but  newly  opened  as  a  port  and  destined  to  become 
one  of  the  leading  cities  of  Japan.  Together  with  the  neigh- 
boring cities  of  Osaka  and  Kyoto,  this  was  to  be  the  perma- 
nent center  of  the  Board's  enterprise  in  the  Japanese  empire. 
Within  the  next  three  years  arrived  substantial  reenforce- 
ments,  Messrs.  0.  H.  Gulick,  Davis,  Berry,  and  Gordon,  and 
their  wives,  men  and  women  whose  influence  in  the  formative 
days  of  the  mission  left  permanent  mark  upon  it.  The  ques- 
tion of  locations  was  perplexing  in  part  from  the  very  ampli- 
tude of  the  field.  Practically  the  whole  southern  half  of 
Japan  from  Yokohama  to  Nagasaki  was  yet  without  any 
Protestant  missionary,  save  that  Bishop  Williams  of  the  Epis- 
copal Church  was  located  at  Osaka. 

It  was  not  easy  to  get  under  way  even  in  1870.  The  law 
against  Christianity  remained  in  force;  Mr.  Greene  could  see 
the  placards  as  he  walked  the  streets  of  Kobe,  and 
W<Sk^^"^^  wondered  whether  the  edict  was  likely  to  be  enforced. 
It  was  almost  impossible  to  secure  a  place  for  meet- 
ings, as  both  by  law  and  custom  neighbors  could  control 
rentals  by  protesting  against  prospective  tenants.  Buddhist 
priests  were  alert  to  hinder  the  missionaries,  and  went  about 
enjoining  a  pledge  of  boycott:  ''Therefore  we  agree  that  if 
any  native  of  this  village  becomes  a  Christian,  we  will  cease 


266  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

to  have  any  intercourse  with  him,  and  if  any  person  dwelling 
here,  not  being  a  native,  embraces  the  foreign  creed,  we  will 
send  him  back  to  his  birthplace." 

Yet  the  stir  of  new  life  was  in  the  air.  While  official  recog- 
nition came  slowly  and  it  was  hard  to  get  a  foothold,  there 
was  almost  a  mania  among  the  Japanese  for  Western  ideas 
and  manners;  it  seemed  that  in  a  moment  freer  access  might 
come.  Shifts  in  temper  and  attitude  were  sudden.  A  reac- 
tionary voice  would  be  heard  one  day,  and,  the  next,  the  same 
voice  would  be  declaring  for  progress  and  Western  knowledge. 

The  first  marked  step  forward  came  with  the  opening  of  an 
exhibition  in  Kyoto,  in  1872,  and  the  granting  of  permission 
to  foreigners  to  visit  it.  The  missionaries  availed  themselves 
of  this  chance  to  venture  on  quiet  efforts  there,  and  Dr.  Berry, 
in  particular,  received  quite  an  ovation  on  his  arrival.  Local 
officials  even  invited  him  with  Mr.  Gulick  to  take  up  residence 
in  that  city;  the  former  as  medical  teacher,  the  latter  as  teacher 
of  English.  Upon  inquiry  it  appeared  that  permission  to 
work  in  the  city  would  involve  a  pledge  not  to  mention  Chris- 
tianity. On  those  terms  the  invitation  could  not  be  accepted, 
and  the  missionaries  withdrew,  though  by  no  means  discour- 
aged as  to  the  outlook. 

When  they  gathered  for  the  annual  meeting  of  the  mission  in 
July,  1872,  all  reports  showed  that  the  attitude  of  the  Japanese 
toward  Christian  teachers  was  rapidly  changing;  before  long 
the  way  would  open  for  swift  advance.  At  the  first  conference 
of  Protestant  missionaries,  held  that  same  year  in  Yokohama, 
a  broad  policy  as  to  the  character  and  methods  of  mission 
work  was  adopted:  ''We  will  use  our  influence  to  secure  as 
far  as  possible  identity  of  name  and  organization  in  the  native 
churches,  in  the  formation  of  which  we  may  be  called  to  assist, 
that  name  being  as  catholic  as  the  Church  of  Christ;  and  the 
organization  being  that  wherein  the  government  of  each  church 
shall  be  by  the  ministry  and  eldership  of  the  same,  with  the 
concurrence  of  the  brethren";  and,   as  to  the  use  of  native 


IN   THE   EMPIRE   OF  JAPAN  267 

workers,  ''whereas  in  the  work  of  foreign  missions  the  native 
element  must  constitute  the  chief  means  for  its  prosecution,  — 
Resolved,  that  we  deem  it  of  the  utmost  importance  to  educate 
a  native  ministry  as  soon  as  possible." 

An  epochal  year  in  the  history  of  Christianity  in  Japan 
came  in   1873,   when  it  was  ordered  that  the  edicts  against 
this  religion  should  be  everywhere  removed.     The 
g  history  of  the   unexpected  event   is   happily  inter- 

woven with  that  of  the  Board's  mission.  The  first 
Japanese  teacher  of  its  missionaries,  Mr.  Ichikawa,  was  seized 
one  midnight  and  with  his  wife  was  carried  away,  no  one  could 
say  where,  though  admittedly  by  the  secret  police  of  the  imperial 
government.  The  abduction  frightened  many  who  were  becom- 
ing interested  in  the  missionaries'  teaching;  it  was  difficult  to 
secure  other  language  teachers.  For  a  time  it  looked  as  though 
a  heavy  injury  had  been  done  the  infant  mission.  A  year  and 
a  half  later  the  wife  of  Ichikawa  returned  to  declare  that  her 
husband,  under  pressure  of  his  arrest,  had  confessed  himself  a 
Christian  and  died  as  one  in  the  Kyoto  prison.  As  a  result, 
she  herself  became  a  believer  and  one  of  the  original  members 
of  the  first  church  organized  by  the  mission.  Soon  after,  in 
the  latter  part  of  1871,  a  Japanese  embassy,  negotiating 
in  Washington  a  revisal  of  treaty,  were  told  that  the 
United  States  government  could  not  cancel  certain  extra- 
territorial clauses  while  the  laws  against  Christianity  remained 
unrepealed.  When  it  was  denied  that  religious  persecution 
existed  longer  in  Japan,  the  case  of  Ichikawa  was  cited.  No 
reply  was  made  at  the  time,  but  the  withdrawal  of  the  proc- 
lamation in  1873  was  regarded  as  the  direct  outcome  of  the 
conference  at  Washington. 

While  official  action  was  thus  more  favorable  to  Christianity, 
private  influences  also  came  to  its  support.  An  article  by 
Paul  Sawayama  in  a  Kobe  newspaper  condemned  the  pre- 
vailing religions  and  urged  the  introduction  of  Christianity 
into  Japan.     Mr.  Greene  was  now  able  to  secure  a  building 


268  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

for  Christian  services  on  a  principal  street  in  Kobe,  part  to 
be  used  as  a  book  depository  and  part  as  a  chapel.  There 
he  began  preaching  to  audiences  that  soon  came  to  fill  the 
room,  sometimes  numbering  as  many  as  200.  Before  the  year 
was  out.  Dr.  Berry  started  in  Kobe  the  first  Sunday-school 
using  the  Japanese  language,  and  Messrs.  Gulick  and  Gordon 
began  pubhc  preaching  services  in  Osaka.  And  while  Chris- 
tianity was  securing  this  footing,  the  decline  of  Buddhism  was 
marked.  Temples  were  deserted  or  leased  for  other  than 
religious  purposes;  one  ship  took  to  England  600  tons  of  bronze, 
of  which  a  large  part  was  in  old  temple  bells. 

In  1873,  also,  Dr.  Berry  began  teaching  in  the  provincial 
hospital  at  Kobe,  having  at  first  ten  pupils,  and  soon  a  large 
Medical  class.  A  lesson  sheet  prepared  daily  was  sent  to 
Work  126  physicians,  who  could  not  leave  their  practise 

Under  to  attend  his  lectures.     So  eager  were  the  native 

^^y  physicians  to  learn  of  European  medical  knowledge 

that  at  the  outset  they  assumed  all  the  cost  of  hospital  and 
dispensary,  and  even  of  medicines  and  the  wages  of  servants; 
later,  the  expense  of  the  dispensary  was  met  by  the  local 
government. 

From  its  beginning  the  medical  work  was  of  utmost  help  in 
gaining  an  approach  to  the  people  and  breaking  down  preju- 
dices. There  was  no  concealment  of  its  Christian  purpose, 
religious  exercises  being  part  of  the  daily  routine  at  the  hos- 
pital and  Christian  publications  being  there  dispensed  along 
with  the  drugs.  From  this  center  medical  tours  were  under- 
taken into  the  outlying  towns,  even  so  far  as  forty  miles  away, 
in  some  of  which  at  length  other  hospitals  and  dispensaries 
were  started,  along  with  the  evangelistic  work  which  developed 
into  churches.  As  Dr.  Berry  made  it  a  rule  not  to  visit  patients 
except  as  a  consulting  physician,  the  native  doctors  being 
left  in  charge  of  the  case  and  receiving  the  fee,  these  Japanese 
doctors  were  ever  glad  of  his  help. 

The  arrival  of  Dr.  Wallace  Taylor  in  1873  increased  the 


IN  THE  EMPIRE  OF  JAPAN  269 

missionary  force  and  gave  opportunity  for  still  wider  tours 
and  the  dedication  of  some  charity  hospitals,  two  of  which 
were  in  old  Buddhist  temples.  At  first,  visits  were  made 
with  great  care.  The  physicians  were  conveyed  in  closed 
jinrikshas  to  private  quarters,  and  the  gates  barred,  their 
patients  being  brought  to  them,  while  they  were  not  allowed 
to  leave  the  place  lest  harm  might  come  to  them.  Gradually, 
as  their  work  became  known,  more  freedom  could  be  allowed, 
and  the  vigilance  of  the  guards  was  somewhat  relaxed. 

Another  important  avenue  of  first  approach  was  the  school. 
The  desire  to  learn  English  was  almost  a  craze  among  the 
Japanese,  and  in  spite  of  prejudice  and  fear  of 
Ooened  persecution,  schools  were  sure  of  pupils.  Messrs. 
Davis  and  Greene  began  a  boys'  boarding  and  day 
school  in  Kobe  in  the  fall  of  1872.  Like  the  medical  work, 
this  could  scarcely  be  called  a  distinctively  mission  enterprise, 
since  from  the  first  it  was  self-supporting  and  the  general 
conduct  of  it  was  in  the  hands  of  a  board  of  officers  self-con- 
stituted by  the  pupils.  The  school  began  with  forty  scholars, 
and,  as  the  Bible  was  made  a  principal  text-book  of  English, 
and  ranked  with  the  sciences  as  a  theme  of  instruction,  and 
on  Sundays,  when  there  was  no  school,  a  voluntary  Bible 
class  was  well  attended,  it  offered  a  fine  chance  for  Christian 
instruction  to  some  exceptionally  eager  and  responsive  youth. 
Some  of  these  early  students  at  Kobe  were  among  the  dis- 
tinguished leaders  of  the  Christian  movement  in  Japan. 

A  similar  school  was  begun  in  Osaka  at  about  the  same  time, 
with  the  advantage  that  a  heavy  reduction  in  the  government 
schools  there  led  many  who  were  shut  out  from  them  to  turn 
to  the  mission.  Though  they  were  seeking  a  knowledge  of 
English  rather  than  of  the  Bible,  they  came  in  crowds,  saying, 
"Please,  master,  teach  me  the  EngUsh  Bible."  Here,  as  in 
the  earlier  missions,  it  proved  that  the  schools  were  in  every 
station  the  foundation  of  the  work.  Mr.  Gordon's  testimony 
was:  "Such  schools  have  been  direct  precursors  of  churches. 


270  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

The  schools  gave  us  not  only  our  opportunity  to  teach  Chris- 
tian truth  in  school  hours  to  our  students,  they  gave  us  also 
our  Sunday  congregations,  composed  mainly  of  the  students 
and  their  friends;  the  Sunday  congregations  grew  into  churches; 
the  pupils  and  helpers  became  our  Christians  and  not  a  few 
of  them  Christian  preachers." 

The  several  Woman's  Boards  were  early  at  work  with  schools 
for  girls  and  women.  So  early  as  1873  Miss  Talcott  and  Miss 
Dudley  began  to  teach  the  girls  at  Kobe.  By  1875  they  felt 
the  time  had  come  for  a  boarding-school.  For  the  first  build- 
ing, thought  to  be  amply  planned  with  accommodations  for 
thirty  girls  and  their  teachers,  Japanese  friends  contributed 
800  yen,  then  equal  to  $800;  when  in  less  than  two  years  a 
second  building  was  needed,  again  they  gave  liberally.  At 
first  it  was  not  easy  to  get  and  hold  pupils  in  these  schools  for 
girls.  Here,  as  in  China,  many  parents  were  suspicious  and 
there  were  all  sorts  of  stories  current  to  discredit  the  foreign 
teachers. 

In  this  early  endeavor  the  mission  won  its  first  influence 
among  the  more  intelligent  and  cultured  classes.  Unlike  many 
lands  to  which  the  Board  had  gone,  in  Japan  they  were  not 
commonly  the  poor  or  the  weak  or  the  despised  who  first 
gave  attention  to  the  gospel,  but  rather  the  alert  and  influen- 
tial men  of  the  country.  There  is  a  memorable  and  charac- 
teristic story  of  Dr.  and  Mrs.  Davis'  stay  at  Arima  in  the 
mountains  just  north  of  Kobe,  during  a  few  weeks  in  the  sum- 
mer of  one  of  these  early  years.  There  they  made  the  acquaint- 
ance of  the  former  daimio  of  the  near-by  district  of  Sanda,  and 
through  sympathy  with  the  daimio's  family,  at  the  time 
of  the  death  of  a  little  child,  a  friendship  was  formed  which 
opened  the  way  to  Dr.  Davis'  coming  to  Sanda,  Dr.  Berry's 
beginning  of  medical  work  there,  and  later  the  undertaking 
of  evangelistic  work  by  many  of  the  missionaries.  Miss  Dudley 
being  notably  successful  during  several  months  of  work  for 
women    and    families.     Out    of    that    acquaintance    came    at 


IN  THE   EMPIRE  OF  JAPAN  271 

length  a  school  of  forty  pupils  and  a  church  of  sixteen  mem- 
bers, twelve  of  them  of  the  samurai  class. 

The  first  church  organized  by  the  mission  was  at  Kobe  in 
1874,  with  a  membership  of  seven  men  and  four  women.  At 
The  Begin-  Osaka,  a  month  later,  a  church  was  constituted 
ning  of  with  seven  men  as  members.  Both  of  these  churches 
Churches  nearly  doubled  in  membership  the  first  year.  An 
enthusiasm  to  preach  characterized  all  these  Japanese  Chris- 
tians. They  seemed  to  feel  that  being  members  of  the  church 
meant  being  preachers  also.  When  the  Kobe  church  numbered 
thirty-two  members,  twenty  of  them  men,  thirteen  of  the 
latter  became  evangelists  without  pay,  going  forth  Sunday 
and  week-days  on  preaching  tours  at  their  own  charges;  the 
women  as  well  as  the  men  were  teaching  or  accompanying 
missionaries  on  their  tours.  When  the  question  of  forming  a 
church  at  Sanda  was  being  discussed,  one  difficulty  which  was 
raised  was  that  they  did  not  know  enough  yet  to  preach. 

Such  was  the  beginning  of  the  churches  which  were  at  length 
to  adopt  the  name,  Kumi-ai.  At  first  they  had  no  distinctive 
name;  they  did  not  care  for  one.  The  mission  had  not 
attempted  to  give  them  denominational  character,  but  at 
the  annual  meeting,  in  1874,  reaffirmed  its  desire  to  promote 
church  union  and  its  purpose  to  continue  organizing  churches 
on  the  broad  basis  of  Christian  fellowship.  The  spirit  of 
independency,  both  in  support,  government,  and  extension, 
was  in  these  churches  from  the  first. 

Another  epoch  in  the  history  of  Christianity  in  Japan  came 
with  the  return  of  Joseph  Hardy  Neesima  to  his  native  country 
Neesima  in  December,  1874.  It  is  not  possible  here  to  relate 
and  the  again  the  life  story  of  this  most  famous  Christian 
Doshisha  j^j^^t  Japan  has  yet  produced.  The  chance  dis- 
covery from  the  reading  of  a  Chinese  Bible  history  that  the 
Creator  of  the  world  had  another  name,  "Heavenly  Father"; 
the  clear  deduction  that  the  supreme  claim  on  his  life  was 
not  that  of  his  earthly  parents,  but  of  God;  the  desire  to  come 


272  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

to  America  to  learn  more  of  this  Heavenly  Father;  the  flight 
from  home,  and  the  venture  on  a  strange  ship  to  work  his 
passage  to  Boston;  the  finding  in  the  owner  of  the  ship,  Hon. 
Alpheus  Hardy,  a  devoted  member  of  the  Prudential  Com- 
mittee of  the  Board,  his  future  patron  and  friend;  the  fixed 
purpose  to  return  to  Japan  to  serve  his  country;  the  years  of 
eager  study  and  preparation  in  academy,  college,  and  sem- 
inary; the  providential  service  with  the  Japanese  embassy, 
opening  the  way  to  wide  and  important  acquaintance  both 
in  this  country  and  in  Japan;  the  prolonged  conference  with 
the  foreign  secretary  of  the  American  Board  over  his  heart's 
desire  for  a  Christian  college  for  his  people;  the  impetuous 
and  irresistible  appeal  at  the  annual  meeting  of  the  Board  in 
Rutland,  in  1874,  when  the  timid  and  unknown  Japanese, 
forgetting  all  of  the  prepared  address  with  which  he  went  on 
the  platform,  could  only  stand  and  with  streaming  eyes,  but 
with  knees  stiffening  under  his  sudden  determination,  declare 
that  he  would  not  take  his  seat  till  his  appeal  was  answered, 
a  challenge  as  convincing  as  audacious  and  that  brought  at 
once  pledges  of  $5000,  and  assured  the  turning  of  a  young 
man's  dream  into  an  accomplished  fact;  all  these  anticipatory 
steps  to  the  actual  work  of  founding  the  Doshisha  can  here 
be  only  suggested. 

Upon  arrival  in  Japan,  after  a  brief  visit  to  his  parents' 
home  in  Annaka,  where  he  spoke  freely  of  Christianity  before 
his  townsmen,  to  the  alarm  of  the  local  governor,  who,  upon 
referring  the  case  to  Tokyo,  was  told,  ''If  it  is  Neesima,  it  is 
all  right;  let  him  alone,"  the  young  man  turned  at  once  to 
consult  the  members  of  the  American  Board  Mission  as  to  the 
carrying  out  of  his  plans.  They  had  been  for  some  time  eager 
for  a  training-school  for  native  preachers  and  teachers.  Nee- 
sima's  thought  was  to  include  with  that  a  college  for  higher 
Christian  education,  the  founding,  indeed,  of  a  university  that 
should  teach  all  sciences  and  train  all  kinds  of  workers  under 
Christian  auspices. 


B 


KASSIMBHAR 
M.    DHALWANI 


India 


B.    PROCHAZKA 


JOSEPH    HARDY 
NEESIMA 

Japan 


Austria 


PASTOR    CHIA 

China 


SARKIS    LEVONIAN 

Turkey 


JAMES   DUBE 

Africa 


REPRESENTATIVE   NATIVE   LEADERS 


IN  THE  EMPIRE  OF  JAPAN  273 

To  combine  all  these  interests  in  a  feasible  plan,  and,  in 
particular,  to  win  the  assent  of  government  officials,  tested 
the  patience,  tact,  and  persistence  of  Neesima.  When  Osaka 
proved  unwilling  to  receive  the  new  institution,  attention  was 
turned  to  Kyoto.  Here  they  had  the  benefit  of  counsel  from 
Mr.  Yamamoto,  the  adviser  of  the  governor.  This  remarkable 
man,  though  blind  and  crippled,  had  a  judgment  so  clear  and 
true  that  his  word  was  almost  authority  with  the  Kyoto  govern- 
ment. A  copy  of  Dr.  Martin's  Evidences  of  Christianity, 
given  him  the  year  before  by  Dr.  Davis,  had  roused  his  interest 
in  Christianity.  Calling  the  governor  to  him,  they  read  the 
book  together  into  the  small  hours  of  the  night,  till  they  were 
convinced  that  here  was  the  solution  not  only  of  the  deeper 
need  of  their  own  hearts,  but  of  Japan's  renovation.  Thus 
prepared  to  meet  Neesima,  Yamamoto  welcomed  him  with 
cordiality  and  urged  the  locating  of  the  new  school  in  his 
city  of  Kyoto. 

Through  Mr.  Neesima's  influence  with  the  central  govern- 
ment, and  in  particular  with  Mr.  Tanaka,  the  Minister  of 
Education,  with  whom  he  had  been  associated  on  the  embassy, 
the  difficult  matter  of  securing  an  imperial  permit  to  found 
this  Christian  school  in  what  was  formerly  the  mikado's  city 
and  a  stronghold  of  Buddhism,  was  at  length  accomplished. 
The  institution,  called  at  first  the  Kyoto  Training  School  and 
ultimately  styled  the  Doshisha  or  ''Same  Purpose  Company," 
was  located  on  land  just  north  of  the  imperial  palace,  and 
Kyoto  became  the  third  station  of  the  Board's  Japan  Mission. 

The  school  was  opened  in  November,  1875,  with  Mr.  Nee- 
sima and  Dr.  Davis  as  teachers,  and  with  eight  pupils,  who 
came,  as  did  all  the  early  students,  from  the  churches  already 
established  in  other  districts.  Even  with  such  powerful  sup- 
port, the  obstacles  in  the  way  of  establishing  the  Doshisha 
were  tremendous.  The  first  six  years  were  anxious  and  full 
of  trouble,  while  yet  inspiring  as  the  opportunities  increased. 
At  once  upon  its  establishment,   the  Buddhist  priests  were 


274  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

furious  and  did  their  best  to  drive  out  this  defiler  of  their 
holy  city.  Local  officials,  made  timid  by  the  attack,  urged 
Mr.  Neesima  to  exercise  utmost  caution,  and  even  to  drop 
the  teaching  of  the  Bible  in  the  school  for  a  while.  It  was 
understood  that  indirectly  much  might  be  done  that  must 
not  be  openly  declared. 

There  came  to  the  school  in  its  second  year  thirty  young 
men  irom  Kumamoto,  who  had  been  under  the  earnest  Chris- 
tian teaching  of  Captain  Janes.  This  retired  United  States 
army  officer  had  gone  to  Japan  as  a  teacher  at  the  invitation 
of  a  daimio  and,  his  term  of  service  being  ended,  had  now  left 
his  students,  who  had  agreed  together  to  spread  the  religion 
of  Christ  through  the  empire.  The  impulse  of  their  presence 
and  influence  on  the  newly  founded  school  was  immediately 
to  broaden  its  field  and  to  increase  its  power. 

The  work  of  the  American  Board's  mission,  as  indeed  of 
Christianity  in  general,  now  began  to  advance  in  Japan  with 
quicker  steps.  As  persecution  was  relaxed,  atten- 
Gaining  ^.^^  ^^^  interest  increased;  there  was  no  difficulty 
in  getting  audiences  at  every  turn.  Missionaries 
came  back  from  their  tours  tired  out,  but  exhilarated  with 
the  opportunities.  Mr.  De  Forest  wrote  from  Osaka:  ''The 
work  here  is  spreading  so  rapidly  that  I  can't  keep  track  of  it. 
Every  few  days  I  hear  of  a  new  place  where  several  services 
have  been  held.  I  went  last  night  into  the  heart  of  this  city, 
between  the  two  greatest  temples  in  this  whole  valley,  and 
met  some  thirty  men  and  women,  who  listened  to  one  of  our 
preachers  till  nine  o'clock."  Mr.  Atkinson,  busy  in  evangel- 
istic touring,  not  only  around  Kobe,  but  on  the  island  of 
Shikoku,  often  faced  crowds  of  from  300  to  700  people  who 
pressed  about  him  to  listen  to  the  gospel. 

Inquirers  came  as  a  result  of  preaching  at  second  hand,  the 
word  of  the  missionaries  being  effectively  repeated  in  places 
where  they  had  never  been.  Two  girls  of  seventeen  and 
nineteen  years  came  thirty-eight  miles  from  their  mountain 


IN  THE  EMPIRE  OF  JAPAN  275 

village  to  Kobe  with  the  definite  errand  to  learn  how  to  sing 
and  how  to  begin  and  end  a  prayer.  Received  with  open 
arms  at  the  Kobe  Home,  after  happy  days  of  instruction  there, 
they  climbed  to  their  village  again  to  tell  the  good  news  that 
they  had  heard.  When  missionaries  followed  some  time  after 
for  a  visit  to  that  town,  they  were  hospitably  received  at  the 
home  of  one  of  these  girls;  later,  the  house  was  thrown  wide 
open  and  a  company  of  eighty  or  ninety  invited  in  to  hear 
the  message,  the  number  growing  on  successive  evenings  to 
several  hundred. 

The  evidence  of  transformed  lives  also  began  to  be  felt. 
The  power  of  the  gospel  was  now  manifest,  not  only  among 
the  more  favored,  educated  classes,  but  among  the  vicious 
and  criminal  as  well.  Keepers  of  gambling  saloons  and  houses 
of  ill  fame  were  reached,  abandoned  their  wicked  pursuits,  and 
used  their  influence  to  try  and  reclaim  those  whom  they  had 
corrupted.  The  gospel  was  carried  to  the  prisons  also,  where 
there  were  found  not  a  few  political  prisoners,  as  well  as  low 
criminals,  and  with  some  striking  results. 

In  1875  Dr.  Berry  secured  permission  to  make  a  tour  of 
inspection  of  the  prisons  in  different  parts  of  the  empire.  His 
report  recommending  many  improvements  was  well  received 
by  the  government  and  was  distributed  widely  among  prison 
officials.  As  a  result  the  governor  of  Kobe  appointed  a  Chris- 
tian, a  member  of  the  church  in  that  city,  as  teacher  in  the 
prison;  soon  he  became  virtually  chaplain,  and  was  able  in 
spite  of  opposition  to  introduce  gradually  some  teaching  in 
Christianity.  As  a  result  of  this  quiet  teaching  eight  prisoners 
soon  formed  themselves  into  ''The  Company  of  the  New 
Covenant,"  pledging  themselves  to  cease  from  violating  the 
law  of  God  and  of  the  land,  and  to  follow  Jesus  as  their  Saviour. 
The  teacher  and  self-appointed  chaplain,  thus  rewarded,  a 
little  later  became  superintendent  of  the  prison,  and  there- 
upon was  able  to  venture  upon  more  direct  Christian  work 
than  before. 


276  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

At  the  same  time  Mr.  Neesima  was  sending  Christian  books 
to  the  prison  at  Otsu,  near  Kyoto,  among  them  a  Chinese 
copy  of  Martin's  Evidences  of  Christianity,  that  had  so  im- 
pressed bhnd  Yamamoto.  One  of  the  more  educated  pris- 
oners translated  it  into  Japanese  for  the  benefit  of  his  fellows, 
most  of  whom  were  uneducated  and  petty  thieves.  At  length 
eighty  men  were  studying  this  Christian  book  and  listening 
to  the  preaching  of  their  leader.  When  fire  broke  out  one 
day  in  the  prison  there  was  no  disturbance;  the  volunteer 
teacher  preserved  order  and  directed  his  forces  to  the  extin- 
guishing of  the  fire.  Upon  the  discovery  that  not  one  had 
escaped,  the  fact  was  so  wonderful  that  it  was  reported  to 
the  authorities  of  the  city,  whereupon  they  released  the  man 
who  had  wrought  this  change,  for  good  conduct.  The  ex-con- 
vict at  once  started  a  private  school  in  Otsu  in  happy  associa- 
tion with  the  missionaries. 

New  lines  of  effort  and  the  enlargement  of  existing  lines 
were  now  the  order  of  the  day.  In  1875  had  appeared  the 
first  Christian  newspaper.  The  Weekly  Messenger, 
th°^W^^  edited  by  Mr.  0.  H.  Gulick,  who  had  had  experience 
in  such  work  in  the  Sandwich  Islands.  A  school 
for  girls,  the  famous  Baikwa,  or  Plum  Blossom  School,  was 
opened  in  Osaka  by  the  two  Congregational  churches,  neither 
of  which  then  had  more  than  twenty-five  members.  It  was 
largely  due  to  the  zeal  of  the  pastor  of  the  second  of  these 
churches,  the  Naniwa,  organized  in  1877,  together  with  Mr. 
Leavitt,  the  foremost  advocate  of  self-support  in  the  Japan 
Mission,  that  the  cost  of  this  school  was  thus  assumed  by  these 
infant  churches. 

Several  new  churches  were  now  organized,  some  of  them 
outside  the  open  ports.  The  two  leaders  in  this  work  were 
Mr.  Neesima,  the  preeminent  Christian  educator  of  Japan, 
and  Paul  Sawayama,  the  prince  of  pastors.  The  service  which 
Mr.  Sawayama  rendered  in  laying  the  foundations  of  the  Chris- 
tian Church  in  the  field  of  the  American  Board's  mission  is 


IN  THE  EMPIRE  OF  JAPAN  277 

beyond  measure.  A  samurai  by  birth,  fully  educated  in  his 
own  land  and  in  the  United  States,  fired  with  the  evangelistic 
zeal  of  the  apostle  whose  name  he  took  and  never  dishonored, 
the  first  Japanese  minister  ordained  and  installed  over  a  church, 
his  life  became  a  flaming  sacrifice  on  the  altar  of  the  Church 
of  Christ  in  Japan.  As  evangelist,  advocate  of  self-support, 
and  educator,  his  zeal  was  untiring;  yet  all  the  while  he  was 
obliged  to  lie  on  a  sick-bed  about  two-thirds  of  the  year.  A 
revelation  of  the  man  appears  in  the  testimony  of  Mr.  Miya- 
gawa,  a  fellow  pastor  in  the  service  of  the  Kumi-ai  Churches: 
''But  when  he  departed  from  us  we  found  a  list  of  the  names 
of  his  church  members,  by  which  he  used  to  pray  to  our  Father 
for  individuals  every  morning  and  evening,  sometimes  shedding 
bloody  tears.  This  list  must  have  been  kept  for  many  years, 
because  it  was  stained  with  much  handling.  In  some  parts 
the  letters  were  indiscernible,  they  were  so  black.  I  thought, 
'This  much-used  list  is  a  monument,  telling  of  his  appeal  to 
his  Father  for  every  member  of  his  church  by  name.'  From 
this  also  I  received  the  answers  to  all  my  questions  concerning 
him,  that  the  secret  of  his  success  was  in  prayer." 

At  a  meeting  of  the  nine  churches  connected  with  the  Ameri- 
can Board  Mission,  in  1878,  a  Japanese  Missionary  Society 
was  formed,  with  its  management  wholly  in  the  hands  of  the 
Japanese,  and  relying  on  them  for  support,  the  churches  prom- 
ising to  make  monthly  contributions  to  it.  Work  began  the 
following  summer  by  sending  theological  students  from 
the  Doshisha  to  places  where  there  were  then  no  Christian 
institutions;  in  many  cases  these  undertakings  have  since  de- 
veloped into  large  and  organized  churches. 

In  1879  Okayama  was  opened  as  a  station  of  the  Board, 
with  the  assignment  of  the  Berrys,  Carys,  and  Pettees.  The 
situation  there  was  inspiring.  The  city  itself  and  the  villages 
round  about  were  opening  up  to  missionary  work.  Govern- 
ment officers  showed  good-will,  and  granted  liberal  concessions. 
Opportunity  was  made  for  the  missionaries  to  render  service 


278  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN   BOARD 

in  connection  with  a  private  school  founded  by  a  former 
daimio ;  the  outlook  for  hospital  and  medical  work  was  par- 
ticularly bright,  with  such  government  regulations  as  promised 
fullest  freedom  for  the  Christian  physician. 

By  1880,  in  one  of  the  Tokyo  churches,  was  celebrated  the 
completion  of  the  translating  of  the  New  Testament,  a  work 
in  which  missionaries  had  been  engaged  for  eight  years.  Hith- 
erto, aside  from  brief  portions  of  the  Scriptures,  only  the 
Chinese  version  had  been  available,  and  its  use  had  been 
restricted  to  the  educated  Japanese.  Now  the  New  Testa- 
ment was  offered  to  the  people  in  their  own  tongue,  and  the 
labor  of  missionaries  of  several  societies,  in  which  Dr.  D.  C. 
Greene  had  represented  the  American  Board,  was  successfully 
accomplished.  The  increase  in  the  sale  of  the  Scriptures  was 
immediate  and  effective.  Thus  the  forces  favoring  Chris- 
tianity were  gaining  in  power;  the  missionaries  were  full  of 
encouragement  and  hope. 

Yet,  while  much  of  the  opposition  and  prejudice  was  con- 
fined to  the  ignorant  and  comparatively  unimportant  classes 
of  the  Japanese,  there  was  also  an  antagonism  which  was  bitter 
and  ominous;  for  there  were  not  wanting  men  from  Christian 
lands  who  were  ready  to  instil  the  venom  of  their  hatred  of 
Christianity  into  the  minds  of  the  Japanese,  friendly  and  impres- 
sionable to  all  Western  teaching.  Moreover,  there  was  a  grow- 
ing materialism  in  the  land  which  was  an  ill  omen  for  the  progress 
of  Christianity.  A  critical  temper  in  religious  discussions  was 
beginning  to  turn  some  away  from  the  gospel.  Yet,  on  the 
whole,  the  tendency  was  strongly  in  favor  of  Christianity;  the 
tide  of  popular  approval  was  to  rise  rapidly  higher  and  stronger. 


Chapter  XV 

IN  THE  DARK  CONTINENT 

Hopes  founded  on  the  removal  of  the  West  African  Mission 
from  Cape  Palmas  to  the  Gaboon  were  disappointed.  As 
The  capable  and  steadfast  missionaries  as  ever  served 

Gaboon  the  Board  put  their  lives  into  this  field.  Rev.  Will- 
Mission  jam  Walker  and  Rev.  Albert  Bushnell,  who  came 
out  just  as  the  transfer  to  the  Gaboon  was  made,  toiled  man- 
fully side  by  side  for  more  than  a  quarter  of  a  century,  or  so 
long  as  the  mission  remained  under  the  American  Board. 
But  despite  the  heroic  struggle  of  these  and  other  devoted  men, 
it  seemed  impossible  to  make  headway.  Once  curiosity  had 
been  satisfied,  the  people  were  quite  indifferent  to  the  message, 
^' their  every  look,  action,  and  groan  during  the  service  seeming 
to  say,  'Behold,  what  a  weariness  is  it.'"  Work  was  under 
way  for  three  communities,  the  Mpwonges,  the  BakeleS,  and 
the  Pangwes,  each  of  these  tribes  probably  representing  a 
separate  migration  from  the  interior.  Among  the  Mpwonges, 
the  head  men  of  the  towns,  the  pupils  in  the  schools,  and  many 
former  pupils  were  accustomed  to  attend  the  services;  the  rest 
of  the  people  generally  stayed  away.  It  was  not  known  that 
the  gospel  had  made  any  transforming  impression  upon  one 
person  in  the  Bakele  nation. 

The"  vice  and  brutality  of  the  coast  life  were  appalling 
obstacles;  heart  and  conscience  often  seemed  eaten  out  of  all 
classes.  And  for  much  of  this  demoralization  men  of  the 
missionaries'  race  were  responsible.  The  powerful  aid  of  many 
naval  officers  in  the  abolishing  of  the  slave  trade,  and  their 
kindnesses  to  the  mission,  were  gratefully  acknowledged;  and 

279 


280  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

the  conduct  of  the  French  government  toward  the  mission- 
aries during  this  period  was  all  that  could  be  desired.  But 
here,  as  in  other  dark  lands,  the  coming  of  white  races  meant, 
on  the  whole,  a  new  debasing  force.  Sometimes  the  injury 
came  from  a  source  that  made  it  peculiarly  hard  to  bear. 
"Think,"  said  one,  facing  the  situation  with  dismay,  "of  a 
Scotch  Presbyterian  elder  sending  100,000  gallons  of  'liquid 
damnation'  to  the  heathen  in  a  single  vessel,  and  atoning 
for  the  whole  by  giving  the  missionary  a  free  passage!  It  is 
these  things  that  kill !  " 

The  strain  of  such  disappointments,  added  to  the  exhaus- 
tion of  persistent  tours  into  the  interior  and  exposure  to  the 
deadly    climate,    wofuUy    reduced    the    missionary 

Its  Trflns— 

-  .  o  force.  Mr.  Herrick  returned  alone  to  the  field  in 
fer  in  1870 

1857    because     Mrs.    Herrick    was   compelled    to 

remain  with  Mrs.  Ford  for  longer  recuperation  in  America, 

before  venturing  once  more  upon  life  at  the  Gaboon.     Within 

four  months  of  his  arrival,  Mr.  Herrick  fell  victim  to  the  fever, 

and  Dr.  Ford,  who  laid  his  colleague's  body  in  the  grave  at 

the  back  of  the  mission  premises,  lived  but  two  months  longer. 

Yet   the   missionaries  toiled    on  through  the  'oOs  and    '60s, 

commending  themselves  to   those  who  watched  their  work. 

Du   Chaillu,   the  African   explorer,   promised  his  aid  for  an 

outstation  at  Kama,  where  he  had  been  dwelling  for  a  year, 

offering  to  give  them  his  premises  outright.     But  through  all 

these  years  the  mission  was  undeniably  weak  and  languishing. 

One-half  the  missionary  force  on  an  average  had  been  obliged 

to  be  absent  from  the  field  because  of  ill  health,  and  many 

lives  had   been  prematurely   laid   down.     In    1860    but    one 

church  could  be  reported,  of  fifteen  members.     Six  years  later 

the  condition  of  this  church  was  deplorable;  all  its  members 

had  gone  far  astray;  it  was  doubtful  if  one  was  in  a  fit  state 

to  come  to  the  communion  table.     At  the  annual  meeting  six 

or  eight  of  the  more  intelligent  members  were  present,  but  not 

one  could  be  appointed  to  an  office.     The  outlook  was  dark. 


IN  THE  DARK  CONTINENT  281 

In  the  transfers  connected  with  the  withdrawal  of  the  Pres- 
byterians from  the  American  Board  in  1870,  the  Gaboon 
Mission  also  was  passed  over  to  them;  how  bravely  and  success- 
fully its  problems  have  since  been  met  belongs  to  the  history 
of  the  Presbyterian  Board. 

While  on  the  west  coast  the  Board's  mission  thus  made 
little  gain,  if  it  did  not  actually  lose  grip  during  this  period, 
The  Zulu  on  the  other  side  of  the  dark  continent  there  was 
Mission,  a  different  story.  The  advance  in  the  Zulu  Mission 
1850  began  with  the  reenforcement  of  1849,  when  nine 

new  missionaries  and  their  wives  came  to  the  help  of  the  four 
families  in  the  field.  The  three  churches  existing  in  that 
year  were  doubled  in  1850;  the  two  schools  of  1842  were  now 
eight,  with  185  pupils;  the  single  convert  who  could  be  counted 
in  1846,  after  eleven  years  of  effort,  had  become  one  of  seventy- 
eight  communicants  in  1850.  Opposition  to  Christianity  was 
suddenly  broken;  the  missionaries  took  heart  and  toiled  on. 

But  they  were  not  even  then  to  win  a  quick  victory.  The 
next  decade  saw  but  one  new  church;  a  wave  of  reaction  had 
Still  Slow  set  in.  The  very  achievements  of  missionary  effort 
and  Dis-  were  an  offense  to  those  who  lusted  after  the  old 
couraging  life  of  their  fathers.  British  authority  in  Natal 
had  Kberated  100,000  Zulus  from  a  cruel  despotism,  but  it 
had  also  resulted  in  a  tightening  of  law  and  order;  the 
missionary  was  an  even  nearer  and  more  insistent  preacher 
of  an  irksome  righteousness.  Many  were  tired  of  hearing 
about  their  sins,  and  being  called  upon  to  lead  a  stricter  life. 
Mr.  Grout,  meeting  a  company  of  natives,  old  and  young, 
about  the  year  1854,  was  thus  addressed  by  one  of  them: 

''Teacher,  white  man!  We  black  people  do  not  like  the 
news  which  you  bring  us.  We  are  black  and  we  like  to  live 
in  darkness  and  sin.  You  trouble  us;  you  oppose  our  customs; 
you  induce  our  children  to  abandon  our  practises;  you  break 
up  our  kraals  and  eat  up  our  cattle;  you  will  be  the  ruin  of 
our  tribe.     And  now  we  tell  you  to-day,  if  you  do  not  cease, 


282  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

we  will  leave  you  and  all  this  region,  and  go  where  the  gospel 
is  not  known  or  heard." 

''But/'  said  Mr.  Grout,  " how  is  this?  I  oppose  your  customs, 
of  course,  because  the  Word  of  God  is  opposed  to  them,  and 
because  they  are  all  wrong,  and  will  be  your  certain  and  endless 
ruin,  if  you  do  not  forsake  them.  Your  children  I  teach,  as 
I  do  you,  to  become  wise  and  good  and  happy.  But  how  do  I 
eat  up  your  cattle,  and  break  up  your  kraals  and  your  tribes  ? 
All  that  I  obtain  from  you  I  pay  for,  do  I  not  ?  And  I  some- 
times try  to  do  you  a  good  turn  besides." 

''Yes.  But  you  teach  repentance  and  faith;  and  a  penitent 
believing  man  is  to  us  as  good  as  dead.  He  no  longer  takes 
any  pleasure  in  our  pursuits,  and  no  longer  labors  to  build 
up  his  father's  kraal;  but  he  leaves  it  and  joins  the  church; 
and  then  he  tries  to  lead  others  away  to  the  station  after  him. 
And  as  to  our  cattle,  our  girls  and  our  women  are  our  cattle, 
but  you  teach  that  they  are  not  cattle,  and  ought  not  to  be 
sold  for  cattle,  but  to  be  taught  and  clothed,  and  made  the 
servants  of  God  and  not  the  slaves  of  men.  That  is  the  way 
you  eat  up  our  cattle.  Many  have  left  us  and  been  engulfed 
at  the  station;  and  more  wish  to  leave  us.  And  now  if  you 
continue  these  labors  and  instructions,  we  shall  just  leave 
you  and  go  to  another  country. 

"See  what  your  new  religion  costs  you.  You  must  buy 
clothes  to  wear,  which  are  only  an  impediment  to  all  action, 
and  buy  soap  to  wash  them,  and  thread  and  needles  to  patch 
and  mend  them.  You  must  be  always  building  upright  houses, 
which  are  cold  and  uncomfortable;  and  must  buy  dishes  to 
eat  in;  must  work  in  the  garden  just  hke  a  woman.  And 
then,  perhaps,  you  must  be  hungry  and  waste  much  time  in 
going  to  meeting  and  learning  to  read.  But  we  live  in  idle- 
ness, which  is  both  agreeable  and  manly.  Our  wives  dig  the 
gardens.  Our  houses  are  warm.  With  our  money  we  buy 
cattle,  which  give  us  food  and  rejoice  our  eyes,  instead  of 
buying  clothes  which  soon  wear  out  and  are  only  in  the  way 


IN  THE  DARK  CONTINENT  283 

while  they  last.  And,  instead  of  going  to  read  and  to  worship, 
we  go  to  hunt  and  to  dance;  and  we  lie  basking  in  the  sun, 
and  take  snuff,  and  smoke  our  pipes,  and  drink  beer,  and  do 
many  other  things." 

Thus  on  the  East  as  on  the  West  of  Africa  there  were  many 
who  had  no  ears  to  hear  the  gospel  message,  and  the  task 
of  the  missionary  was  a  slow  and  patient  hammering  of  the 
rock. 

"Engulfing  at  the  station,"  to  which  objection  was  made, 
refers  to  the  practise  of  forming  communities  of  native  adher- 
Mission  ents  around  the  several  stations.  In  this  way  they 
Reserves,  were  removed  from  the  degrading  influence  of  the 
^856  kraals    and    brought   under  more   continuous   mis- 

sionary influence.  The  colonial  government  cordially  approved 
the  plan  and,  in  1856,  granted  large  tracts  of  land,  surrounding 
the  residences  of  the  missionaries  and  known  as  Mission 
Reserves,  for  the  use  of  these  native  communities.  The  allot- 
ment for  missionary  residences  was  outright,  virtually  a  glebe 
donated  by  the  government;  the  land  for  the  natives'  use  was 
put  in  the  hands  of  trustees,  representing  both  the  government 
and  the  mission;  no  rent  was  then  required. 

This  plan  of  segregating  the  Christian  natives  became 
thenceforth  an  important  factor  in  the  progress  of  the  Zulu 
Mission.  Gradually  the  Reserves  were  occupied  by  those 
natives  who  were  disposed  to  adopt  civilized  and  Christian 
habits  of  life;  houses  were  built  and  fields  planted;  their  chil- 
dren were  sent  to  mission  schools,  their  families  went  to 
the  mission  church;  a  Christianized  society  developed.  The 
Reserves  were  regarded  as  centers  of  light  for  their  region  by 
which  the  darkness  would  at  length  be  driven  from  the  whole 
land.  Later  there  was  to  be  trouble  over  these  Reserves, 
much  as  trouble  came  over  Indian  reservations  in  this  country; 
but  for  the  time  they  seemed  both  to  the  government  and  the 
mission  a  happy  device  for  civilizing  and  Christianizing  the 
Zulu. 


284  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

Thus  with  a  place  to  work  in,  some  people  at  hand  to  work 
upon,  and  a  race  all  about  to  work  for,  the  mission  toiled  hope- 
fully through  the  rather   hard   years   of   the   '50s. 

or  ng  rpj^^  immorality  of  the  people  was  disheartening;  it 
often  seemed  as  though  there  was  nothing  to  build 
on;  no  basis  of  conviction,  steadiness  of  purpose,  or  sense  of 
loyalty.  To  instil  moral  ideas  into  those  who  offered  them- 
selves for  Christian  training  was  a  difficult  task.  A  sharp 
conflict  was  brought  on  by  the  effort  to  banish  polygamy 
from  the  homes  of  the  Christians;  the  discussion  in  1855-56 
filled  the  land  with  controversy,  especially  as  the  eminent 
Bishop  Colenso  threw  the  weight  of  his  influence  against  inter- 
fering with  this  native  custom. 

But  in  their  stations  and  on  the  Reserves  the  missionaries 
worked  patiently  and  there  were  some  manifest  gains.  Com- 
mon schools  were  prosperous,  aided  and  encouraged  by  the 
colonial  government.  In  1853  Amanzimtoti  Seminary,  a 
boys'  high  school,  was  begun  modestly  by  Mr.  Rood,  and 
rapidly  developed.  Within  seven  years  it  trained  some  of  the 
best  native  pastors  the  mission  has  had,  and  so  proved  its 
value  that,  though  closed  by  Mr.  Rood's  failing  health,  it 
was  reopened  in  1865  to  become  at  once  the  institution  of 
men's  higher  education  and  pastoral  training  for  the  mission. 
These  years  of  inconspicuous  labor  were  also  in  part  spent  in 
preparing  and  issuing  the  Scriptures  and  text-books  which 
the  broadening  work  necessitated. 

And  there  were  outward  signs  of  progress  even  then.  The 
crusade  against  polygamy  had  such  effect  that  in  a  land  where 
ten  years  before  no  other  ideal  of  marriage  was  known,  there  were 
now  100  monogamous  families  on  the  Reserves;  and  between 
sixty  and  seventy  of  these  families  had  abandoned  the  Kaffir 
hut  for  a  house.  Sir  George  Grey,  governor  at  Cape  Town, 
was  moved  to  express  to  a  United  States  commission  his  grati- 
tude to  the  American  Board  for  what  it  was  doing  through  its 
missionaries  for  the  native  and  heathen  inhabitants  of  the  colony. 


IN  THE  DARK  CONTINENT  285 

The  forming  of  a  native  home  missionary  society  in  1860 
marked  the  beginning  of  a  new  era.  In  five  years  it  had  three 
A  Cheering  missionaries  in  the  field,  and  the  churches  were 
Decade,  feehng  a  new  responsibiUty  and  enthusiasm.  Their 
1860-70  gifts  were  increasing  as  well  as  their  disposition  to 
evangelize  their  countrymen;  native  pastors  were  coming  for- 
ward to  take  charge  of  churches  that  were  moving  steadily 
toward  independence. 

One  of  these  three  native  home  missionaries  was  set  over 
an  outstation  where  a  church  of  ten  members  had  been  gath- 
ered with  no  missionary  to  lead  them.  Less  than  twenty 
years  before  a  missionary  since  gone  from  earth  had  found 
this  Umbiyana  a  careless  heathen,  instructed  him,  brought 
him  to  Christ,  and  started  him  on  the  way  to  his  Christian 
ministry.  Mr.  Tyler,  who  was  present  at  the  service  which 
marked  the  beginning  of  this  pastorate,  felt  as  if  he  was  shar- 
ing the  exultation  of  the  angels  as  he  looked  about  upon  the 
large  company  gathered  in  that  almost  inaccessible  locality 
in  the  high  mountains  and  partook  of  the  Lord's  Supper  with 
his  Zulu  brethren. 

The  missionaries  were  enjoying  the  reward  of  their  labors. 
It  was  the  greatness  and,  as  it  seemed,  the  suddenness  of  the 
change  wrought  in  the  land  that  were  most  felt,  rather  than 
the  obstacles  and  the  delay.  Mr.  Grout,  who  had  toiled  for 
eleven  years  before  he  baptized  the  first  convert,  and  who  had 
been  driven  away  from  three  stations,  wrote:  "If  I  was  a  fool 
in  the  eyes  of  some  men,  yet  called  and  sent  of  God,  as  I  then 
believed,  I  have  lived  to  see  in  this  work  of  God  a  hundredfold 
more  done  than  I  ever  dreamed  that  I  might  effect  in  a  long 
life.  And  if  I  have  suffered  all  that  missionaries  do  in  ordinary 
missionary  work,  I  can  cheerfully  say  that  I  have  suffered  far 
less  than  I  anticipated,  and  enjoyed  a  hundredfold  more  than 
I  expected.  Every  promise  of  God  has  been  abundantly 
fulfilled  to  me,  and  I  would  not  to-day,  for  time  or  eternity, 
change  situations  with  my  most  gifted  classmates."    When 


286  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

at  length  he  returned  to  America,  Mr.  Grout  took  pleasure 
in  replying  to  some  friends,  who,  on  his  departure  to  Africa, 
had  charged  him  with  going  on  a  wild-goose  chase,  ''Well, 
if  I  did,  I've  caught  my  goose." 

Henceforth  there  was  a  lessening  need  for  the  missionaries 
to  assume  pastoral  care  of  the  churches;  their  chief  work  was 
now  to  be  in  providing  higher  education  and  Christian  litera- 
ture. The  awakened  Zulu  began  to  show  a  love  of  money  and 
a  disposition  to  make  godliness  a  way  of  gain;  the  tendency 
was  here  quite  the  opposite  of  that  in  the  Sandwich  Islands, 
where  civilization  was  neglected  in  the  enthusiasm  for  religion. 
The  spiritual  ideals,  motives,  and  forces  were  needing  the 
missionary's  most  devoted  furtherance. 

In  1869  a  theological  school  was  opened,  first  as  a  branch 
of  the  Amanzimtoti  Seminary  for  boys,  but  soon  becoming  a 
separate  school  with  its  distinctive  and  high  task  of  preparing 
religious  leaders.  The  same  year  Mrs.  M.  K.  Edwards  opened 
at  Inanda  the  first  school  in  South  Africa  for  native  girls, 
and  has  continued  with  it  to  this  day.  Successful  from  the 
start,  with  an  annual  attendance  of  150,  this  school  has  been 
sending  forth  a  stream  of  teachers  and  home  makers  to  leaven 
the  land  with  Christianity.  A  similar  school  at  Umzumbe, 
opened  in  1873  and  intended  for  kraal  girls,  was  soon  com- 
pelled to  raise  its  grade  and  become  distinctively  a  training- 
school  for  teachers,  like  Inanda,  and  with  a  roll  of  pupils  almost 
as  large.  These  schools,  with  their  drill  and  discipline,  were 
doubly  important  for  those  who  were  to  become  leaders  of  a 
race  still  so  close  to  savagery. 

Progress  toward  supplying  native  churches  with  pastors 
of  their  own  was  steady  if  not  rapid.  By  1870  there  were 
three  of  these  ordained  pastors  without  dependence  on  the 
mission.  The  last  settled  was  James  Dube,  of  Inanda,  brother 
of  the  tribal  chief,  a  man  six  feet  three  inches  in  height,  of 
splendid  figure  and  presence,  who  had  renounced  every  rag 
and  tatter  of  heathenism  and  still  held  the  regard  of  his  people. 


IN  THE  DARK  CONTINENT  287 

To  this  wise  and  noble  man,  with  the  board  of  four  good  men 
chosen  to  aid  him  as  deacons,  the  missionaries  who  dehghted 
in  them  looked  to  see  the  Inanda  church  brought  to  be  a  true 
spiritual  temple. 

And  now  this  Zulu  Mission,  one  of  the  smallest  in  territory 
which  the  Board  has  occupied,  stretching  west  but  seventy- 
five  miles  from  the  sea  to  the  Drackenbergs,  and 
the^Fie^d^^  with  the  narrow  boundaries  of  the  Tugela  River  on 
the  north,  and  the  Umzumbe  on  the  south,  needed 
an  outlet  for  its  rising  Christian  life.  There  was  plenty  yet 
to  be  done  in  Natal;  heathen  at  home  and  the  Christians  on 
the  Reserves  were  still  in  need  of  constant  watch  and  care. 
Missionaries  were  not  looking  about  for  something  to  do; 
native  pastors  were  not  out  of  a  field.  But  in  the  70s 
it  was  clear  to  the  observant  leaders  of  the  mission  that  the 
Zulu  churches,  growing  in  number,  size,  and  zeal,  needed  a 
definite  missionary  objective  to  widen  their  horizon,  to  deepen 
their  sympathies,  and  to  develop  self-sacrifice. 

The  Zulus  are  characteristically  orators;  they  make  good 
preachers,  and  they  have  the  evangelistic  temper;  they  are 
quick  to  respond  to  calls  for  such  service.  A  Zulu  church  is 
not  a  mere  congregation  of  listeners;  its  men  expect  to  go  out 
and  repeat  the  message  they  have  heard.  As  it  became  known 
that  the  Zulu  language  was  spoken  beyond  the  boundaries 
of  this  mission  and  understood  far  to  the  north  and  among 
interior  tribes,  the  idea  grew  that  the  Christian  Zulu  was 
meant  to  be  the  evangelist  of  eastern  Africa.  And  for  this 
task  there  were  new  tools  now  ready;  considerable  portions  of 
the  Bible,  including  the  New  Testament  entire,  in  Zulu;  Mr. 
Dohne's  dictionary  of  the  language,  and  Lewis  Grout's  gram- 
mar, the  last-named  text-book  being  still  in  use. 

This  disposition  to  push  out  to  new  fields  was  mightily 
reenforced  with  the  coming  to  the  mission,  in  1871,  of  Rev. 
Myron  W.  Pinkerton.  "The  specific  object,"  he  soon  wrote, 
"which  most  excites   my  enthusiasm   is  to  go  up  the  deep, 


288  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

broad,  and  rugged  valleys  of  the  Umtwalumi  and  Ifafa,  where 
thousands  of  heathen  dwell,  who  have  heard  little  or  nothing 
of  the  Saviour.  I  hope  the  Master  will  give  me  both  the 
spiritual  power  and  the  strong  bone  and  muscle  to  fill  these 
hilly  districts  with  churches  and  schools."  And  while  busy  in 
such  itinerating  of  his  field,  this  missionary  with  the  heart  of 
Paul  was  constantly  hoping,  aided  by  the  Zulu  Christians,  to 
extend  the  mission  into  remoter  regions  as  yet  altogether 
untouched. 

The  project  of  an  advance  was  made  more  definite  by  the 
new  interest  awakened  in  Central  Africa  through  the  explora- 
tions of  Henry  M.  Stanley,  and  his  impressive  plea  for  mis- 
sionaries for  that  region.  Both  England  and  America  were 
stirred  by  this  appeal,  and  fresh  impulse  was  given  to  the 
idea  that  the  missionary  societies  of  both  lands  should  stretch 
a  chain  of  missions  across  the  dark  continent.  Generous 
proposals  made  in  1877  by  a  wealthy  Englishman,  Robert 
Arthington,  of  Leeds,  and  which  in  many  ways  quickened  and 
enlarged  missionary  work  in  Africa,  fell  just  short  of  securing 
the  cooperation  of  the  American  Board  in  a  part  of  the  under- 
taking; another  plan  was  soon  to  be  adopted. 

Meanwhile  in   the  field    already  occupied  the  missionaries 

were  laboring  to  develop  a  sturdy  and  responsible  type  of 

Christian  character,  and  to  awaken  aspirations  for 
Tugging 
Along  ^  better  life  among  the  stolid  Zulus  of  the  kraals. 

It   was   wearisome   work   and   often   discouraging. 

And  beyond  the  ordinary  drag  of  a  hard  field  came  now  and 

then  violent  and  alarming  events  to  trouble  the  hearts  of  the 

missionaries.     A  recrudescence  of  heathenism  was  felt  in  the 

later  70s;  not  merely  the  lapse  here  and  there  of  a  church 

member  or  a  pupil  from  the  schools,  but  a  general  sag  in  the 

churches    and    communities,    in   which   some   who    had   been 

leaders  in  religious  and  social  affairs  were  inclined  to  revert 

to  polygamy,  the  practise  of  selling  daughters  for  cattle,  called 

lobolisa,  the  drinking  of  native  beer,  and  other  degrading  cus- 


IN  THE  DARK  CONTINENT  289 

toms.  The  war  of  1877-79  between  the  British  and  the  Zulus, 
which  ended  in  the  practical  subjugation  of  the  natives,  was 
another  unsettling  influence  with  which  the  mission  had  to 
contend. 

Matters  were  brought  to  a  crisis  in  1880,  when  rules  were 
adopted  forbidding  to  church  members  polygamous  marriage, 
the  practise  of  lobolisa,  and  the  use  of  intoxicants.  It  was  not 
easy  at  once  to  enforce  these  rules;  the  churches  were  thrown 
into  tumult;  sorrow  and  perplexity  were  for  a  while  the  habitual 
condition  of  the  missionaries.  But  they  held  firm,  the  churches 
were  purified  of  these  gross  inconsistencies,  higher  standards 
were  accepted,  and  a  fairer  type  of  Christian  behavior  appeared. 
In  that  very  year,  1880,  the  veteran  Josiah  Tyler,  reviewing  the 
course  of  the  mission,  marked  the  sure  evidences  of  its  success. 

''Good  work  has  been  accomplished,  and  it  is  foundation 
work  among  the  most  degraded  people  to  whom  the  A.  B.  C. 
F.  M.  has  sent  missionaries.  Before  the  Word  of  God  came 
here,  a  wide  pall  of  barbarism  spread  over  the  whole  land.  It 
was  like  ancient  Galilee,  'the  region  and  shadow  of  death.' 
I  have  heard  one  of  the  oldest  missionaries  say  that,  when  he 
came  here,  throughout  the  length  and  breadth  of  Natal  not 
a  single  native  had  on  his  body  the  least  mark  of  civilization; 
and  the  minds  of  the  natives  were  fearfully  destitute  of  thought 
except  that  which  pertained  to  their  own  sensual  gratification. 
But,  thank  God,  light  has  sprung  up  in  South  Africa;  spirit 
worship  is  being  abandoned,  civilization  is  advancing;  upright 
and  neatly  whitewashed  dwellings,  constructed  after  the  Eng- 
lish fashion,  are  taking  the  place  of  the  low,  beehive-like  huts 
of  their  ancestors;  the  daily  schools  on  mission  stations  are 
well  attended;  the  two  seminaries  of  a  higher  order  —  one 
for  males  and  the  other  for  females  —  are  flourishing;  the 
native  Home  Missionary  Society  supports  three  ordained 
ministers,  and  has  a  surplus  of  funds  in  its  treasury;  our  Sab- 
bath audiences  were  never  so  large  as  at  present;  and,  alto- 
gether, I  see  great  reason  for  encouragement." 


Chapter  XVI 
IN  NOMINALLY  CHRISTIAN   LANDS 

The   American   Board   made   early   efforts   to   enter   lands 

nominally  Christian.     It  was  on  the  heart  of  Samuel  Mills 

that  the  United  States  was  specially  responsible  for 

^^^^  the  evansrelization  of  South  America,  and  in  1813 

Purpose 

he  proposed  that  the  Board  should  send  him  to 

that  continent  on  a  commission  of  inquiry.  The  same  year 
the  Prudential  Committee  was  directed  to  consider  the  expe- 
diency of  establishing  a  mission  in  San  Salvador,  Brazil.  Both 
these  proposals  came  to  naught,  but  ten  years  later  Messrs. 
John  C.  Brigham  and  Theophilus  Parvin  were  despatched  on 
an  exploring  tour  to  the  more  important  parts  of  Spanish 
America.  They  made  Buenos  Ayres  the  base  for  their  investi- 
gations and  Parvin  opened  a  school  there;  when  it  soon  became 
self-supporting  he  was  honorably  discharged  from  the  Board's 
service  to  continue  this  educational  work.  Brigham  was  left 
to  continue  alone  the  long  and  important  tour  across  the  con- 
tinent to  Chile,  up  the  western  coast  to  Peru,  thence  to  Mexico, 
and  back  to  the  United  States,  bringing  valuable  information 
as  to  these  lands  in  which  paganism  and  Latin  Christianity 
were  strangely  mingled.  The  judgment,  however,  was  adverse 
to  attempting  a  mission  in  any  of  those  lands  at  this  time; 
the  long  tour  was  but  one  more  labor  of  path-finding  in  the 
Board's  effort  to  determine  the  most  urgent  fields. 

Not   until    1871    did   the   American   Board   undertake   any 
Four  work  in  lands  where  Roman  Catholicism  was  domi- 

Missions  nant,  and  then  not  upon  its  own  initiative.  At  that 
Undertaken  ^[jj^q  ^he  American  and  Foreign  Christian  Union, 
which  for  twenty  years  had  been   conducting  mission  work 

290 


IN  NOMINALLY  CHRISTIAN  LANDS  291 

among  Romanists  in  foreign  countries  as  well  as  in  the  United 
States,  was  losing  some  of  its  supporters.  They  felt  that 
this  society  was  too  harsh  in  its  attacks  upon  Romanism,  or 
that  one  not  organized  directly  to  combat  the  papacy  would 
be  more  successful;  they  argued  that  the  work  could  be  done 
more  economically  also  by  a  larger  and  more  fully  equipped 
organization.  The  Congregational  churches  in  particular  were 
drawing  away  from  the  Union,  and  in  1871  presented  a  memorial 
to  the  Board,  which  had  successfully  dealt  with  various  bodies 
of  nominal  Christians  in  the  Levant,  urging  it  to  undertake 
this  work.  Whereupon,  with  some  hesitancy,  the  Board 
accepted  it  as  a  duty  to  extend  its  work  on  behalf  of  nominally 
Christian  peoples.  Within  a  year  the  Prudential  Committee 
had  begun  missions  in  Spain,  Austria,  and  Mexico;  in  1873  an 
attempt  was  made  to  get  foothold  in  Italy. 

There  was  no  expectation  of  making  proselytes  of  the  great 
body  of  the  people  in  these  countries  nor  any  such  desire. 
The  instructions  were  explicit  on  this  point:  ''In  going  to 
countries  where  the  evangelical  work  is  already  begun,  the 
missionaries  of  the  Board  will  be  careful  not  to  build  up  a 
separate  interest,  but  rather  to  become  fellow  helpers  unto 
the  truth,  and  thus  to  illustrate,  to  the  eyes  of  Romanists,  a 
true  Christian  unity.  The  special  object  of  their  efforts  will 
be  to  raise  up  an  efficient  native  ministry.  Each  nation  must 
be  evangelized  by  its  own  sons;  and  the  limit  of  our  duty  will  be 
reached  when  such  assistance  has  been  rendered  as  will  enable 
them  to  take  up  and  complete  the  work  of  evangelization." 
But  inasmuch  as  the  Bible  was  a  forbidden  book  in  several 
of  these  countries,  and  the  people  were  held  in  superstition 
and  ignorance,  with  little  incentive  and  no  help  to  improve, 
there  was  justification  for  some  effort  to  convey  to  them  the 
light  of  the  free  gospel. 

To  provide  funds  needed  for  this  new  enterprise,  estimated 
at  from  $25,000  to  $35,000,  and  to  secure  therefor  gifts  which 
were  being  withheld  from  the  American  and  Foreign  Christian 


292  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

Union,  it  was  agreed  that  a  separate  offering  should  be  sought 
for  this  purpose  from  the  churches  connected  with  the  Board. 
Unfortunately  this  virtual  pledge  of  an  extra  gift  was  not 
fulfilled  save  by  a  few  churches,  and  the  Board  had  to  carry 
the  burden  of  a  larger  task  with  but  little  increase  in  its 
resources. 

In  Italy  alone  of  the  countries  entered  were  evangelical 
churches  already  established.  The  Board  attempted  to  work 
The  with  them  and  with  the  Waldensians,  the  Italian 

Attempt  in  Free  Church,  and  other  independent  bodjes,  but 
Italy,  1873  gQon  found  that  such  cooperation  was  impossible 
without  abandoning  its  principles  of  self-support  and  self- 
government;  moreover,  it  was  difficult  to  find  a  clear  field 
where  the  newcomer  could  operate  without  overlapping.  In 
the  face  of  these  embarrassments  and  as  the  receipts  for  mis- 
sions in  papal  lands  were  not  coming  in  as  expected,  and  the 
financial  condition  of  the  Board  was  cramped,  it  was  soon 
judged  best  to  suspend  the  undertaking  in  Italy.  After  a 
year  of  brave  and  resourceful  attempt  by  Rev.  and  Mrs.  Walter 
S.  Alexander  and  Dr.  and  Mrs.  Luther  H.  Gulick,  in  1874  the 
missionaries  withdrew. 

Spain  was  entered  at  a  fortunate  time. '  The  revolution  of 
September,  1868,  opened  a  new  era.  Heretofore  all  religious 
reform  had  been  violently  suppressed,  even  the 
eginnings  g^^^y  ^^  ^^le  Scriptures  in  secret  being  a  high  crime. 
Now  the  Spanish  Cortes  adopted  a  new  constitu- 
tion, which,  while  maintaining  Roman  Catholicism  as  the 
religion  of  the  land,  promised  rehgious  Hberty  to  Spaniards 
as  well  as  foreigners.  Though  it  was  soon  to  be  learned  that 
in  Spain  as  in  Turkey  the  granting  of  toleration  by  statute 
did  not  prevent  indirect  and  even  open  persecution,  a  real 
gain  was  made  by  this  overturning.  A  month  after  the  revo- 
lution a  public  evangelical  service  was  held  in  Seville;  a  church 
was  organized  before  the  year  closed  and  a  Protestant  church 
edifice   opened   for  worship.     Similar  services  were   held   by 


IN  NOMINALLY  CHRISTIAN   LANDS  293 

those  of  evangelical  temper  in  several  of  the  leading  cities  of 
the  kingdom.  Bibles  and  other  religious  publications  were 
widely  scattered  by  evangelists  and  colporters  in  spite  of 
bitter  opposition  by  Roman  Catholic  priests. 

Under  these  new  conditions  and  entering  into  the  labors  of 
various  independent  agencies,  the  American  Board  began  its 
work  in  1872.  Locations  were  chosen  in  the  northern  part  of 
Spain,  as  that  was  a  field  largely  untouched  as  yet  by  Prot- 
estant agencies.  Rev.  and  Mrs.  William  H.  GuUck,  the  former 
already  knowing  the  Spanish  language,  and  having  had  three 
years'  experience  as  a  missionary  in  South  America,  settled 
at  Santander,  a  city  of  20,000  inhabitants  on  the  coast;  Dr. 
Luther  H.  Gulick,  with  twenty  years'  experience  in  missionary 
work  in  the  Micronesian  and  Hawaiian  Islands,  located  at 
Barcelona,  a  commercial  city  of  200,000,  sometimes  called  the 
Manchester  of  Spain,  from  which  place  he  was  transferred  in 
a  few  months  to  undertake  the  short-Hved  venture  in  Italy. 
The  following  year  another  brother,  Rev.  Thomas  L.  Gulick, 
joined  the  mission,  and  located  at  length  in  Zaragoza,  due 
west  from  Barcelona  and  some  200  miles  south  of  San  Sebas- 
tian. 

Work  was  begun  with  utmost  caution  and  experiment. 
With  the  gaining  of  acquaintance  and  some  use  of  the  language, 
several  schools  were  established,  evangelical  literature  was  judi- 
ciously distributed,  and  a  few  native  preachers  were  secured  who 
had  obtained  their  education  in  Switzerland.  It  was  almost 
impossible  at  first  to  secure  a  place  for  worship.  ''Finally, 
at  Santander,  a  room  forty  feet  long  by  thirty  feet  wide, 
which  had  been  used  as  a  storeroom  for  fish,  was  found  in 
the  second  story  of  a  double  house,  and  fitted  up  for  a  chapel. 
The  walls  and  ceilings  were  whitewashed;  unpainted  pine 
plank  benches  and  an  unpainted  table  for  a  desk  were  used; 
here  the  little  congregation  gathered  and  the  services  were 
often  interrupted  by  stones  thrown  through  the  windows, 
some  of  them  as  large  as  a  man's  fist.     Though  these  demon- 


294  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

strations  reduced  the  size  of  the  congregations,  yet  there  were 
some  who  were  faithful  in  coming,  and  in  a  few  hearts  the 
truth  found  lodgment." 

The  times  were  stormy;  Carlists  were  making  warlike  demon- 
strations; it  was  difficult  to  forecast  the  poHtical  future.  Yet 
In  the  Face  the  mission  was  not  hindered  directly.  Touring 
of  Perse-  among  the  villages  of  the  region  was  possible,  and 
cution  everywhere    curiosity   at   least  was  stirred.     Some 

sincere  inquirers  were  continually  found,  many  of  them  secret 
disciples;  113  famiUes  in  Santander  took  the  weekly  Spanish 
evangelical  paper.  The  Christian,  though  not  more  than  thirty 
people  ventured  to  attend  the  Sunday  services.  It  was  plain 
there  were  unsatisfied  and  aching  hearts  to  be  reached  in  this 
fair  but  oppressed  land.  A  company  of  basket-makers  from  a 
village  in  the  Cantabrian  Mountains,  who  brought  their  wares 
each  summer  to  Santander,  were  led  to  the  Protestant  service 
by  a  shoemaker  who  was  a  member  of  the  church.  The  mes- 
sage they  heard  there  went  to  their  hearts  and,  when  they 
returned  to  their  mountain  village  at  the  close  of  the  summer, 
they  established  regular  meetings  for  prayer  and  Bible  reading. 

In  these  early  years  it  was  chiefly  the  laboring  classes  that 
Hstened  to  the  missionary;  social  as  well  as  ecclesiastical  influ- 
ence was  against  him.  A  junta  of  Catholic  ladies  was  formed 
to  watch  the  missionaries  and  counteract  their  work.  Sys- 
tematic and  ceaseless  persecution  followed  every  Protestant; 
no  one  but  an  eye-witness,  said  the  missionaries,  could  form 
a  correct  idea  of  what  the  poor  people  suffered  for  the  gospel's 
sake.  When  entreaties  and  bribes  would  not  suffice,  even 
this  junta  of  ladies  was  not  above  threats,  forcing  landlords 
and  employers  to  put  the  ban  on  Protestants. 

By  1876  the  first  evangelical  church  in  northern  Spain 
was  organized  in  Santander  with  seventeen  members,  devoted 
not  to  Congregationalism  or  any  other  ism,  but  open  to  dis- 
ciples of  every  name.  A  new  church  was  organized  at  Zara- 
goza  with  seventy-five  members  from  the  old  body  and  twelve 


IN  NOMINALLY  CHRISTIAN   LANDS  295 

new  converts.  Here  at  the  same  time  a  school  for  boys  was 
opened  and  soon  another  for  girls.  In  December  an  evening 
school  was  started  for  adult  pupils,  and  after  the  Week  of 
Prayer  there  was  a  marked  religious  quickening  among  them. 
Zaragoza  had  been  the  scene  of  a  noisy  opposition.  Protestants 
were  hooted  on  the  streets;  stones  were  thrown  at  the  chapel 
and  services  interrupted;  once  a  funeral  service  was  broken 
up  by  the  authorities,  who  carried  off  the  body,  determined  to 
prevent  a  Protestant  burial.  When  friends  protested,  the  family 
was  summoned  to  court  for  resistance  and  the  Protestant 
pastor  was  imprisoned  for  ten  days  for  interfering  with  the 
Roman  Catholic  rites.  In  one  town,  as  brethren  from  San- 
tander  were  selhng  Bibles  and  tracts,  a  priest  bought  a  Bible, 
tore  out  some  of  its  leaves,  and  burned  it.  The  effect  was  not 
quite  what  he  intended,  as  it  so  stirred  the  curiosity  of  the 
people  that  many  inquiries  followed.  The  homes  of  native 
Christians  were  sometimes  beset  by  mobs,  while  stones  and 
bullets  hammered  the  walls.  The  missionaries  and  evan- 
gelists learned  what  it  was  to  be  stoned  and  even  fired 
upon  as  they  went  their  rounds,  and  to  escape  as  by  a  miracle. 
An  educated  Spanish  lady,  school-teacher  of  the  mission,  was 
stoned  on  the  public  square  of  Zaragoza  by  a  crowd  of  twenty 
yelling  boys,  without  a  hand  raised  in  her  defense. 

Notwithstanding  this  determined  opposition,  political  dis- 
turbances, and  lack  of  support  by  the  home  churches,  much 
was  accomplished.  New  villages  and  even  districts  opened 
up  encouragingly,  particularly  in  the  mountains  of  Asturias. 
The  picture  of  beginnings  in  one  of  these  mountain  districts 
indicates  both  the  difficulties  and  inspirations  of  this  work. 
In  AUevia  a  little  house  was  rented  for  a  chapel  by  a  leading 
friend  of  the  evangelical  movement.  The  required  notice  of 
its  intended  use  was  given  to  the  mayor,  and  on  the  evening  of 
its  dedication  three  tin  lamps  threw  a  dim  light  on  the  com- 
pany of  about  forty-five  persons  listening  earnestly,  '^with 
occasional  sobs,"  and  also  with  some  fears.     Opposition   was 


296  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

immediate  and  intense.  The  helper  from  Santander,  put  in 
charge  of  the  work,  reported  increased  numbers  in  attendance, 
some  of  the  people  coming  from  many  miles  away,  but  also 
increased  persecution.  The  bishop  sent  a  special  delegate  and 
two  Jesuit  missionaries  to  guard  his  flock.  Mingled  promises 
and  threats  made  their  natural  impression  on  the  minds  of 
the  simple  villagers.  From  neighboring  villages  came  a  rabble 
of  fanatics  to  terrify  them.  Some  who  were  merely  curious 
were  frightened  back  to  the  old  fold;  but  it  was  impressive  to 
see  with  what  heroism  many  stood  firm.  With  no  pastor,  as 
sheep  without  a  shepherd,  they  bravely  faced  their  great  trial. 

At  the  end  of  ten  years  there  were  connected  with  the  two 
important  stations  six  outstations;  two  native  pastors  and 
A  Good  seven  native  preachers;  three  churches,  with  215 
Accom-  members;  a  boarding-school  for  girls,  with  eleven 
plishment  pupils,  and  a  total  of  209  pupils  in  all  schools.  Yet 
these  figures  show  the  least  part  of  what  had  been  done  in 
those  years;  hundreds  of  towns  and  villages  were  now  more 
or  less  eager  for  a  better  type  of  religious  life;  new  mission- 
aries were  importunately  called  for  to  meet  the  opportunities. 
Yet  instead  of  reenforcement  came  retrenchment;  for  want 
of  needed  appropriations  a  school  of  sixty  pupils  was  closed. 
In  1881  Mr.  and  Mrs.  W.  H.  Guhck  removed  to  San  Sebastian, 
near  the  border  of  France,  and  after  the  withdrawal  of  Rev. 
T.  L.  Gulick,  because  of  ill  health,  there  was  left  to  the  mission 
in  Spain  but  this  one  station.  The  centers  thus  vacated  were 
put  in  charge  of  efficient  Spanish  evangelists  and  pastors. 
But  in  the  face  of  every  kind  of  persecution,  and  the  untiring 
energy  of  Jesuit  and  Franciscan  missioners,  traversing  the 
provinces  to  warn  off  all  attendants  on  Protestant  teaching,  it 
was  a  pitifully  undermanned  mission  that  was  to  be  found  in 
Spain  at  the  close  of  the  '70s. 

If  the  opening  of  the  Mission  to  Spain  was  beset  with  obstacles, 
the  task  in  Austria  was  even  more  difficult.  "In  no  other  mis- 
sion field  occupied  by  the  Board,"   is  the  report  after  sev- 


IN  NOMINALLY  CHRISTIAN  LANDS  297 

eral  years  of  endeavor,  '^are  so  great  hindrances  encountered 
to  the  dissemination  of  the  truth  as  in  Austria.  The  utmost 
ingenuity  of  which  Jesuit  experience  and  craft  are 
*  A  t  capable  has  been  employed  to  devise  legal  restric- 
tions upon  every  possible  form  of  evangelical  effort 
from  abroad.  The  missionary  can  enter  no  pulpit;  can  hold 
no  public  service  to  lecture  or  preach  or  read  the  Scriptures, 
without  applying  to  the  local  authorities  for  a  permission 
which  they  are  at  liberty  to  withhold.  The  giving  away 
even  of  a  tract  may  subject  to  a  fine,  and,  if  the  offense  is 
repeated,  to  imprisonment  or  exile  from  the  country." 

Three  men,  with  their  wives.  Rev.  and  Mrs.  E.  A.  Adams, 
Rev.  and  Mrs.  Henry  A.  Schauffler,  and  Rev.  and  Mrs.  A.  W. 
Clark,  made  the  brave  beginning  in  1872,  locating  at  first  in 
Bohemia,  the  land  of  John  Huss,  and  at  the  capital  city,  Prague. 
When,  in  December  of  the  following  year,  they  had  secured  a 
place  for  a  service  and  posted  a  notice,  according  to  the  law, 
of  a  Bible  lecture  to  be  given  the  following  Sunday  on  the 
theme,  "Loving  One's  Neighbor,"  the  chief  of  pohce  flatly 
refused  to  allow  the  service.  At  length  reluctant  permission 
was  granted  to  hold  the  meeting,  but  only  at  the  home  of  the 
missionaries,  and  for  invited  guests;  a  license  fee  was  required 
and  a  police  officer  was  in  attendance  to  watch  the  proceedings. 
Every  item  in  the  service  was  scrutinized,  professedly  as  a 
safeguard  against  some  political  plot;  when  an  attempt  was 
made  to  introduce  singing,  the  officer  objected,  giving  his 
consent  only  after  being  reminded  that  men  were  allowed  to 
sing  freely  even  in  the  saloons. 

In  spite  of  such  restrictions  the  winter  showed  unexpected 
progress.  An  intelligent  and  attentive  audience  of  100  to  150 
was  secured,  including  some  of  the  Reformed  Church,  who 
were  tired  of  infidehty  and  glad  to  hear  the  gospel.  A  Sunday- 
school  was  started  in  Mrs.  Schauffier's  parlor  for  German  chil- 
dren; later,  Bohemian  boys  were  included.  Colporters  and 
evangelists  were  secured  as   openings  appeared,  but  as  Aus- 


298  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

trian  law  forbade  the  disposal    of  tracts  in  any  way  except 

by  gift  or  immediate  sale  and  required  colporters  simply  to 

show  samples  and  take  orders,  this   department   was  much 

restricted. 

At  the  opening  of    1874  opposition  became   so  oppressive 

that  it  was  determined  to  seek  new  locations.     Innsbruck  in 

the  Tyrol  was  selected  for  the  Clarks  and  Bissells, 

„  ,      ^         Briinn    in  Moravia  for  the  Schaufflers,   while  the 
Relocate  ' 

Adamses  remained  at  Prague.  Yet  after  this 
rearrangement  they  were  not  to  find  the  way  opening  easily 
or  at  once  before  them.  Mr.  Schauffler  at  Briinn  was  abso- 
lutely prohibited  from  inviting  even  a  half  dozen  Christian 
friends  to  his  house  for  worship,  though  many  were  eager  to 
come.  He  was  for  a  time  allowed  to  give  lectures  on  the 
Bible  if  he  would  pledge  himself  not  to  pray  or  sing  or  per- 
form any  other  act  of  worship;  but  even  this  privilege  was 
afterward  denied  through  the  efforts  of  a  Roman  priest  and 
a  Lutheran  pastor. 

The  chief  service  which  the  missionaries  in  Moravia  were 
then  able  to  render  was  through  personal  intercourse  with  a 
few  individual  believers,  especially  some  pastors;  for,  in  con- 
trast with  the  situation  in  Prague  and  Bohemia,  in  Moravia 
the  pastors  of  the  Reformed  Church  began  to  show  sympathy 
with  the  missionaries'  effort.  Circumstances  diverted  the  Clarks 
from  Innsbruck  to  Gratz,  where  the  same  general  methods 
were  pursued  as  in  other  parts  of  the  field,  with  particular 
care  not  to  transgress  the  law.  In  Prague  disappointment 
was  met  when,  near  the  close  of  1875,  fresh  and  intenser 
complaints  against  the  missionaries  compelled  the  closing  of 
the  Sabbath- school,  and  finally  the  suppression  of  all  public 
services.  By  working  to  help  Bohemians  of  evangelical  temper, 
notably  in  aiding  the  school  for  girls  established  near  Prague 
by  Pastor  Schubert,  whose  work  as  preacher  in  the  mission 
hall  in  Prague  had  been  a  notable  help,  the  mission's  influence 
was  indirectly  maintained  until  fairer  times  should  come. 


IN  NOMINALLY   CHRISTIAN   LANDS  299 

Such  better  times  did  come  as  a  result  of  patient  waiting. 
By  an  appeal  to  Vienna  the  mahgnant  action  against  the 
work  of  the  Schaufflers  in  Brlinn  was  reversed,  and  a  limited 
opportunity  was  allowed  them.  Through  the  kind  offices  of 
Dr.  Joseph  P.  Thompson  with  the  Evangelical  Alliance  at 
its  session  of  1879  in  Basle,  Switzerland,  an  appeal  was  pre- 
sented to  the  emperor  of  Austria,  resulting  in  the  redress  of 
some  of  the  grievances  set  forth. 

One  ground  of  objection  to  the  missionaries'  efforts  was  the 
criticism,  not  altogether  uncomplimentary,  that  they  taught 
too  strict  a  religion.  The  type  which  would  be 
-,  approved  is  described  as   "an  easy  kind,   leaving 

out  the  hard  things  and  retaining  the  comforting 
ones."  The  report  of  the  missionaries  in  this  regard  is  not 
without  a  touch  of  humor.  "  If  missionaries  insist  that  'Remem- 
ber the  Sabbath  day '  means  anything  more  than  to  have  the 
best  time  possible,  wherever  and  with  whomsoever  it  may  be; 
or  that  '  Thou  shalt  not  commit  adultery  '  means  anything 
more  than  outward  deference  to  public  opinion,  not  at  all  to 
be  strictly  interpreted  among  friends;  that  'Thou  shalt  not 
bear  false  witness  against  thy  neighbor  '  means  anything  like 
reproof,  or  censure,  or  prohibition  of  lying  or  deceiving  one 
another;  or  that  'Thou  shalt  not  steal'  or  'Thou  shalt  not 
covet '  mean  that  we  shall  not  take  advantage  of  our  neighbor, 
and  get  what  we  can  from  him, — all  this  makes  the  gospel 
too  onerous.  Hence  some,  who  for  a  time  came  to  hear,  find 
the  instructions  of  the  missionaries  hard  sayings  and  turn 
away.  One  attendant  on  the  service  declared  her  intention 
of  leaving  the  meetings  because  when  the  missionaries  spoke 
against  lying  some  of  the  audience  looked  at  her.  She  knew 
she  sinned  often  in  this  way,  but  it  hurt  her  feelings  to  have 
it  spoken  of  as  a  sin." 

Despite  opposition,  political,  ecclesiastical,  and  personal, 
headway  was  made.  The  first  church  was  organized  in  June, 
1880,  in  the  house  of  Mr.  Clark,  in  Prague,  as  the  Free  Reformed 


300  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

Church  of  Bohemia,  with  twenty-six  members.  The  mission 
that  had  struggled  for  its  very  Hfe  had  become  at  last  so  far 
established  as  to  be  ready  for  the  next  stage  in  its  develop- 
ment. 

In  Mexico  the  American  Board  encountered  a  strange  mix- 
ture of  races  and  of  culture.  One-half  the  population  was  of 
The  pure  Indian  origin,  a  small  fraction  pure  Spanish, 

Mission  to  the  rest  a  mixture  of  the  two  races.  All  degrees 
Mexico  of  civilization  were  found,  from  the  barbarism  and 
even  savagery  of  the  Indians  in  the  mountains  of  the  northwest 
to  the  polished  manners  of  the  Spanish  gentleman.  The 
Indian  element  was  the  more  vigorous  and  capable,  the  mixed 
race  occupying  the  high  positions  in  political,  commercial, 
and  educational  affairs. 

While  the  Roman  Catholics  claimed  about  ninety-five  per 
cent  of  the  population,  this  claim  was  found  to  be  greatly 
exaggerated.  The  new  constitution  of  1860  had  proclaimed 
religious  liberty  and  opened  the  way  for  Protestant  mission- 
aries. Unsettled  conditions  delayed  for  a  time  any  missionary 
advance,  but  the  growing  sense  of  freedom  in  the  state  stimu- 
lated the  desire  for  religious  liberty,  and  the  power  of  the  priests 
began  to  be  shaken,  from  a  conviction  that  they  had  been  the 
oppressors  of  the  people. 

The  time  seemed  providential  for  the  American  Board  to 
begin  its  work  in  the  young  republic.  Other  societies  had 
made  a  beginning  since  1865.  The  Presbyterians  and  Metho- 
dists had  entered  the  central  and  southern  portions  of  the 
country;  the  northern  and  western  parts  of  the  republic  were 
left  as  a  clear  field  for  the  American  Board.  Miss  Rankin, 
associated  with  the  American  and  Foreign  Christian  Union, 
was  ready  to  transfer  her  mission,  centering  at  Monterey,  to 
its  care.  Two  of  the  three  members  of  the  first  graduating 
class  of  the  Pacific  Seminary  offered  themselves  as  missionaries; 
with  the  sending  of  these  two  young  men,  Rev.  J.  L.  Stephens 
and  Rev.   David  F.  Watkins,   in   1872,   to  Guadalajara,   the 


IN  NOMINALLY  CHRISTIAN   LANDS  301 

capital  of  the  state  of  that  name,  the  work  of  the  American 
Board  in  this  land  was  started. 

The  young  missionaries  at  once   found   influential   friends 

who  promised  aid  and  counsel ;  among  them  the  governor  of  the 

state  and  the  superintendent  of  public  instruction. 

lajara"  '  ^^  ^^^^'  ^^^^'  *^^^  ^^^^  besieged  with  callers  eager 
to  talk  with  them  on  rehgious  subjects.  Opposition 
and  abuse  followed;  letters  were  thrown  in  at  the  windows 
declaring,  '' Mexicans  do  not  want  Protestant  rascals,"  and 
warning  them  to  take  care.  But  Mr.  Stephens  was  living  in 
the  same  house  with  the  commander-in-chief  of  the  Mexican 
army,  who  declared  that  he  would  publish  the  threat  and  would 
defend  the  missionaries  with  his  whole  army  if  necessary. 

Here,  as  in  all  of  these  nominally  Christian  lands,  the  press 
was  of  great  value  in  getting  hold  of  the  people.  From  the 
first,  American  tracts  and  Bibles  were  in  demand;  stocks  were 
sold  out  almost  as  soon  as  received.  When  public  meetings 
could  not  be  held  it  was  always  possible  quietly  to  scatter 
the  printed  Word.  A  thousand  tracts  on  the  duty  of  reading 
the  Bible  could  be  distributed  in  the  city  of  Guadalajara  during 
Holy  Week  and  passed  through  many  hands  as  the  streets 
were  crowded.  People  would  come  in  from  towns  and  vil- 
lages in  all  directions  to  secure  papers  containing  news  respect- 
ing the  religion  of  Jesus  Christ.  As  the  Roman  Catholics 
were  printing  eight  different  papers  weekly,  with  the  special 
object  of  attacking  the  missionaries,  there  was  no  lack  of 
advertising.  The  mission  felt  at  once  the  need  of  a  press  of 
its  own  which  Catholic  influence  could  not  control. 

Notwithstanding  the  fierceness  of  the  opposition,  the  mis- 
sionaries won  a  large  circle  of  friends,  among  whom  were  some 
of  the  Romanists  themselves.  Once  only  in  those  early  daj^s 
did  they  suffer  physical  attack,  when  a  party  of  men  and  boys 
threw  stones  at  them,  slightly  injuring  Mr.  Watkins.  Guada- 
lajara was  indignant  at  the  outrage,  and  it  was  admitted  that 
the  blow  was  worse  for  Catholicism  than  for  Mr.  Watkins. 


302  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

By  the  close  of  1874  the  opposition  of  the  Romanists  seemed 
to  be  dying  down;  the  missionaries  could  go  about  and  preach 
without  hindrance,  meeting  everywhere  with  marked  kindness. 
Mr.  Watkins'  house  had  become  too  small  for  the  weekly 
services  and  the  governor  had  sent  word  that  he  hoped  soon 
to  give  him  a  good  building  for  public  meetings.  More  than 
100  had  been  added  to  the  ''Society  of  Reformed  Cathohcs  " 
within  the  year  and  more  than  200  seemed  to  be  so  earnest 
in  the  Christian  life  that  they  could  be  sent  out,  in  turn,  to 
carry  the  gospel  to  others. 

At  the  Northern  Mission  around  Monterey  it  was  possible 
to  push  out  somewhat,  and  it  was  encouraging  to  find  people 
awakening  from  their  sleep  of  indifference.  Ten 
__  churches  were  reported  in  1874,  with  220  members; 

there  were  125  pupils  in  the  schools,  and  three 
new  churches  had  been  formed  within  the  year.  One  method 
of  outreaching  is  indicated  by  the  story  of  three  members  of 
the  Monterey  church,  men  who  made  crockery  and  sold  it 
through  the  state.  As  they  went  through  districts  where  there 
were  no  evangelical  churches,  in  small  towns  and  haciendas, 
they  would  sell  their  wares  in  the  daytime  and  at  night  would 
collect  little  companies  of  people  to  read  the  Bible  and  pray. 
Thus  many  were  reached  who  would  have  turned  a  deaf  ear 
to  the  missionaries,  and  seed  was  scattered  widely  over  a 
needy  field. 

In  the  winter  of  1873  the  town  of  Ahualulco,  about  ninety 
miles  from  Guadalajara,  had  shown  itself  so  cordial  to  the 
The  Assas-  Protestant  teaching  that  it  was  decided  to  make  it  a 
sination  new  outpost.  Day  and  evening  schools  were  begun, 
of  Mr.  and  public  services  held.     After  the  first  few  days 

Stephens  q£  opposition  all  tumult  seemed  to  subside.  But 
on  the  2d  of  March,  1874,  under  cover  of  night,  a  mob  of 
about  200,  stirred  to  anger  by  Roman  priests,  assaulted  the 
house  of  Mr.  Stephens.  Forcing  the  doors,  they  brutally 
assassinated   the   helpless   missionary,  hacking  his  head   into 


IN  NOMINALLY   CHRISTIAN   LANDS  303 

several  parts,  and  mutilating  the  body.  To  the  ferocity  of 
murder  was  added  the  shame  of  robbery,  as  they  stripped  the 
body  and  carried  off  everything  they  could  find  in  the  house. 
To  cap  all,  they  entered  the  church  and  rang  twice  a  merry 
peal  of  bells.  It  appeared  afterward  that  the  plot  contem- 
plated the  killing,  not  only  of  this  noble  soldier  of  the  cross, 
but  of  all  his  comrades  in  the  Mexican  Mission.  Seven  of 
the  guilty  ruffians  were  tried  and  condemned  to  death;  it  was 
almost  impossible  to  secure  an  execution,  but  five  of  them 
finally  suffered  the  death  penal t}^ 

Despite  the  shock  to  the  mission,  and  the  fears  which  this 
tragedy  aroused  in  many  of  the  adherents,  evangelical  work 
was  not  to  be  wiped  out.  Schools  dwindled  somewhat,  but 
the  ''reunion  "  or  congregation  in  Guadalajara  was  but  slightly 
affected.  The  hunger  for  the  gospel  in  Mexico  was  evident 
and  inspiring.  Converts  could  recite  large  portions  both  of 
the  Old  and  New  Testaments;  nor  did  those  who  heard  the 
Word  listen  for  themselves  alone;  many  were  active  in  spreading 
the  good  news.  On  Christmas  Day  of  1874,  at  the  close  of  the 
year  whose  early  months  had  been  so  portentous,  fifty-six 
were  added  to  the  church  in  Guadalajara,  making  a  total 
membership  of  seventy-one.  Many  of  these  were  from  the 
very  town  of  Ahualulco  where  Mr.  Stephens  was  murdered. 
In  July  of  the  following  year  twenty  more  were  added.  Here 
and  in  northern  Mexico  work  was  spreading  into  outlying 
pueblos  or  villages,  where  had  gone  those  who  had  been  won 
to  the  evangelical  faith. 

With  the  increasing  opportunities  for  preaching  and  the 
growing  number  of  inquirers  who  needed  to  be  taught,  the 
The  Need  mission  was  in  dire  straits  for  trained  men  to  do 
of  Trained  this  work.  Miss  Strong's  school  at  Monterey  was 
Workers  training  some  thirty  girls,  but  as  yet  very  few  young 
men  had  been  put  under  a  course  of  instruction;  a  mission 
seminary  was  an  urgent  necessity  if  the  work  was  to  grow. 
Many   slightly  trained   workers,  who   had   been   pressed  into 


304  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

service,  it  was  found  necessary  to  release  because  of  their 
inadequate  preparation  for  their  task.  The  enforced  return 
to  the  United  States  of  some  of  the  few  missionaries  stationed 
in  Mexico,  and  the  lack  of  reenforcements  and  of  support  for 
this  young  mission,  gradually  brought  its  endeavors  almost 
to  a  standstill,  save  for  such  unorganized  advance  as  could  be 
made  b}^  native  Christians  passing  on  the  message.  It  will 
appear  in  the  next  period  how  work  was  resumed  by  the  Ameri- 
can Board,  and  how  the  seed  that  had  been  sown  and  nourished 
by  martyr's  blood  was  to  bear  its  harvest  in  a  strong  and 
aggressive  mission. 


Chapter  XVII 

APPROACHING  MATURITY 

This  second  period  in  the  American  Board's  life,  from  1850 
to  1880,  showed  as  marked  development  in  its  organization 
The  En-  ^^  home  as  in  its  operations  abroad.  To  begin 
largement  Tsdth,  it  grew  bigger  as  the  years  went  on.  As 
of  the  Or-  first  constituted,  no  limit  was  set  upon  membership; 
ganization  ^j^^  ^^y  ruigg  prescribed  by  the  charter  required 
that  members  should  be  elected  by  ballot  at  the  annual  meet- 
ing and  'Hhat  not  less  than  one-third  shall  be  composed  of 
respectable  laymen,  that  another  third  shall  be  composed 
of  respectable  clergj^men,  and  the  remaining  third  to  be  com- 
posed of  characters  of  the  same  description,  whether  clergy- 
men or  lajTQen." 

But  as  the  United  States  increased  in  number  and  the  Great 
West  began  to  be  developed,  and,  moreover,  as  the  churches 
then  working  through  the  Board  also  multipHed,  it  became 
necessary  both  to  limit  the  membership  of  the  Board  and  to 
determine  a  fairer  ratio  of  representation.  Accordingly,  at 
the  annual  meeting  of  1864,  rules  were  for  the  first  time  adopted 
concerning  the  election  of  members.  As  finally  accepted  they 
fixed  the  number  of  active  members  at  150,  with  the  same 
distinction  as  to  lay  and  clerical  as  before;  called  upon  the 
active  members  to  accept  their  membership  as  a  pledge  to 
be  constant  in  attendance  at  the  annual  meetings  of  the  Board; 
provided  that  the  proportion  of  Congregational  members  to 
Presbyterian  should  be  two  to  one,  and  settled  upon  a  fixed 
proportion  of  the  total  number  for  each  of  the  several  states. 
From  time  to  time  the  limit  of  membership  was  raised  until 
the  corporation  had  grown  to  225  members  in  1880. 

305 


306  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

The  statistics  of  residence  of  the  members  at  the  beginning 
and  end  of  this  period  indicate  something  of  the  changes 
going  on  in  the  ^'home  base."  In  1850,  81  were  from  New 
England,  47  from  New  York,  10  from  New  Jersey,  18  from 
Pennsylvania,  22  from  the  rest  of  the  country.  This  rest  of 
the  country  then  included  a  few  of  the  Southern  states,  Vir- 
ginia, Maryland,  South  Carolina,  Georgia,  Tennessee,  and  what 
was  then  the  Great  West,  Ohio,  Indiana,  Missouri,  and  Michi- 
gan, one  representative  coming  from  each  of  the  three  states 
last  named.  In  1880  there  were  128  members  from  New 
England,  25  from  New  York,  4  from  New  Jersey,  and  2  from 
Pennsylvania;  one  each  from  Virginia  and  Alabama,  the  reduc- 
tion being  due  to  the  withdrawal  of  the  Presbyterian  and  Dutch 
Reformed  churches  from  the  support  of  the  Board.  The 
growth  of  the  West  is  evidenced  by  the  fact  that  Illinois, 
Wisconsin,  Minnesota,  Iowa,  and  Cahfornia  now  appeared, 
each  with  several  representatives,  while  Kansas,  Dakota,  and 
Oregon  had  one  each. 

The  deaths  and  withdrawals  from  the  corporation  during 
this  period,  271  in  number,  far  exceeded  the  total  membership 
at  its  close,  when  the  Board  had  become  in  its  personnel  prac- 
tically a  new  organization.  The  changes  among  the  Board's 
officers  were  no  less  marked.  When  the  Reformed  Church  in 
America  withdrew  to  form  its  own  missionary  organization,  in 
1857,  Hon.  Theodore  Frelinghuysen,  a  distinguished  member 
of  that  Church,  felt  compelled  to  resign  from  the  presidency 
of  the  Board.  Thereupon  Mark  Hopkins,  president  of  Will- 
iams College,  was  chosen  to  the  office,  which  he  held  for  thirty 
years.  His  name  gave  distinction  to  the  Board  in  many  quar- 
ters, his  genius  and  counsel  brought  wisdom  to  its  adminis- 
tration, and  his  significant  addresses  at  the  annual  meetings 
added  much  to  the  celebrity  and  stimulus  of  those  historic 
occasions.  In  1857,  also,  Mr.  WiUiam  Jessup  was  chosen  to 
the  vice-presidency,  and  he  was  followed  in  1864  by  another 
distinguished  Presbyterian  layman,   Mr.   William  E.   Dodge. 


SELAH    B.    TREAT 

Secretary,  1847-1877 


RUFUS    ANDERSON 

Secretary,  1832-1866 


LANGDON    S.  WARD 

Treasurer,  1865-1895 


MARK    HOPKINS 

President,  1857-1887 


EDMUND    K.    ALDEN 

Secretary,  1876-1893 


JUDSON    SMITH 

Secretary,  1884-1906 


NATHANIEL    G.  CLARK 

Secretary,  1865-1894 


RICHARD    S.    STORRS 

President,  1887-1897 


^ 


1%^ 

0~ 


P 


SARAH    L.    BOWKER 

President,  W.  B.  M. 
1868-1890 


JOHN   O.    MEANS 

Secretary,  1880-1883 
LATER  OFFICERS  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 


APPROACHING   MATURITY  307 

The  withdrawal  of  Secretary  Rufus  Anderson,  in  1866,  after 
thirty-four  years  of  magnificent  service  in  the  Board,  the  death 
of  Secretary  Treat,  in  1877,  after  a  hke  prolonged  term  of 
faithful  and  efficient  labor,  and  the  resignation  of  Secretary 
George  W.  Wood,  in  1871,  to  resume  missionary  work  in 
Turkey,  left  as  executive  officers,  at  the  close  of  the  period. 
Secretary  Nathaniel  G.  Clark  and  Treasurer  Langdon  S. 
Ward,  who  had  come  into  the  service  since  1865,  and  Secretary 
Edmund  K.  Alden,  whose  election  was  in  1876. 

Notable  changes  had  come  also  in  the  make-up  of  the  Pru- 
dential Committee  by  the  decease  of  those  who  linked  the 
earlier  years  of  beginning  with  this  period  of  more  normal 
growth:  Charles  Stoddard,  John  Tappan,  and  Nehemiah 
Adams,  the  first  named  serving  on  the  committee  for  forty- 
one  years,  during  the  last  thirteen  of  which  he  acted  as  its 
chairman.  No  other  layman  in  the  United  States  or  Europe, 
it  was  believed,  had  rendered  larger  service  to  the  foreign 
missionary  cause.  Near  the  beginning  of  this  period  there 
came  to  the  Committee,  Rev.  Augustus  C.  Thompson,  D.D., 
and  Willian  T.  Eustis;  a  little  later,  Linus  Child,  Henry  Hill 
(after  thirty-four  years  as  treasurer),  and  Alpheus  Hardy;  and 
at  length,  Abner  Kingman,  Ezra  Farnsworth,  J.  Russell  Brad- 
ford, Joseph  S.  Ropes,  and  James  M.  Gordon  (after  ten  years' 
service  as  treasurer),  men  who  were  to  transmit  the  traditional 
character  and  ability  of  the  Committee  to  the  later  time. 

The  work  of  the  American  Board  could  not  but  be  affected 
by  the  War  of  the  Rebellion.     The  anticipation  of  it,  as  it  became 

imminent,  brought  to  the  supporters  of  the  Board 
yjr  the  added  sorrow  of  danger  to  the  interests  they 

were  guarding.  It  seemed  inevitable  that  the 
thought  of  the  nation  would  be  absorbed  in  the  conflict;  that 
her  young  men  would  be  swept  into  the  armies,  and  that  the 
cost  of  the  war  would  dry  up  the  springs  of  benevolence  or 
divert  them  to  other  than  missionary  channels.  Yet  the 
result  did  not  so  prove.     There  was  for  a  while  a  reduced 


308  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

number  of  missionary  candidates,  but  the  Board's  supporters 
proved  loyal  to  it  through  all  the  draining  years  of  the  war. 
While  there  was  a  temporary  stringency  at  one  time  or  another 
during  the  period,  at  the  end  there  was  not  only  no  debt,  but 
a  balance  in  the  treasury. 

Moreover,  the  issues  of  the  war  removed  from  the  platform 
of  the  Board's  annual  meetings  and  from  the  burden  of  its 
administration  questions  that  had  proved  very  heavy  during 
the  years  preceding.  Indeed,  before  the  close  of  the  war  the 
Board  had  clearly  voiced  its  antagonism  to  slavery,  which 
earlier  it  had  affirmed  more  mildly.  At  the  annual  meeting  of 
1861,  in  one  of  two  resolutions  on  the  subject,  it  declared, 
**we  fervently  implore  the  God  of  nations  so  to  overrule  the 
conflict  that  the  rebellion  may  be  crushed;  slavery,  its  prime 
cause,  removed;  and  that  peace,  prosperity,  and  righteous- 
ness may  be  permanently  established  throughout  our  whole 
land." 

One  unforeseen  but  prized  benefit  which  the  war  brought 
to  the  Board  was  its  awakening  of  sjmnpathies  on  the  mission 
fields.  It  has  been  already  recounted  that  in  several  of  the 
missions,  notably  India  and  Turkey,  extra  efforts  were  made 
in  the  direction  of  self-support,  and  special  gifts  came  from 
native  Christians,  and  not  a  few  foreign  residents,  some  of 
them  high  in  official  life,  to  help  fill  the  treasury  when  the 
regular  sources  of  supply  were  likely  to  be  reduced. 

The  American  Board  in  this  period  also  drew  to  itself  the 
interest  and  support  of  many  friends  outside  its  natural  con- 
stituency. The  organization  of  the  Turkish  Mis- 
.,,.  sions  Aid  Society  in  England,  in  1854,  shows  the 

impression  which  its  work  was  making  in  that  land. 
Formed  to  aid  ''evangelical  missions  in  western  Asia  and  the 
east  of  Europe,  especially  those  of  the  American  Board,"  and 
with  the  Earl  of  Shaftesbury  as  president  and  several  dis- 
tinguished and  titled  men  on  its  board  of  officers,  this  society 
contributed  in  the  first  year  of  its  existence  about  $5000  to 


APPROACHING  MATURITY  309 

the  Turkish  missions  of  the  American  Board,  and  thenceforth 
became  an  annual  contributor.  In  the  critical  times  of  1863 
the  Free  Church  of  Scotland  gave  £1300  in  aid  of  American 
missions  in  India  and  Turkey,  one-third  of  which  was  grate- 
fully received  by  the  American  Board. 

Ties  of  comradeship  with  English  friends  of  missions  were 
still  further  cemented  by  the  general  conference  at  Mildmay 
Park  in  October,  1878,  the  modest  forerunner  of  the  world 
conferences  of  to-day.  Following  that  assembly.  Rev.  E.  G. 
Porter,  of  Lexington,  Massachusetts,  representing  the  Board, 
through  meetings  in  public  halls  and  private  drawing-rooms 
in  different  parts  of  England,  won  new  and  influential  friends 
for  its  enterprises  in  Asia  Minor,  where  Great  Britain  was  then 
exercising  a  protectorate. 

The  aid  of  the  Bible  societies,  British  and  American,  had 
become  so  substantial  and  adequate  that  in  1863  the  Board 
was  prompted  to  secure  an  amendment  to  its  charter  releasing 
it  from  the  obligation  to  use  for  the  work  of  translation  and 
publication  so  large  a  percentage  of  its  funds  as  the  original 
act  had  required. 

The  Board  was  organized  on  undenominational  lines.  At 
the  outset,  before  work  had  fairly  begun,  its  corporate  mem- 
Withdrawal  bers  included  one  Episcopalian,  one  member  of  the 
of  Cooper-  Dutch  Reformed  Church  and  six  Presbyterians; 
ating  afterward  the  German  Reformed  Church  was  also 

Churches  represented.  On  the  foreign  field  Congregational- 
ists  were  in  happy  cooperation  not  only  with  Presbyterians 
and  Dutch  Reformed  Church  brethren,  but  with  those  of  other 
communions.  The  Japan  Mission  during  its  early  years  in- 
cluded members  of  six  different  denominations,  Presbyterians, 
Cumberland  Presbyterians,  Dutch  Reformed,  Baptists,  and 
Methodists,  as  well  as  Congregationalists.  For  a  while  the 
Cumberland  Presbyterian  Church  conducted  most  of  its  for- 
eign missionary  work  through  the  American  Board,  contribut- 
ing both  men  and  money.     Even  after  that  church  maintained 


310  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

a  mission  of  its  own  in  Japan,  Dr.  M.  L.  Gordon  remained  a 
loved  and  valued  member  of  the  American  Board  Mission. 

Two  bodies  of  the  Christian  Church,  which  had  been  united 
with  the  Board  in  missionary  work,  withdrew  during  this 
period.  The  Reformed  Church  in  America,  commonly  called 
the  Dutch  Reformed  Church,  after  twenty-five  years  of  united 
work,  formed  its  own  foreign  missionary  organization  in  1857; 
and  in  1870,  upon  the  reunion  of  the  two  wings  of  the  Pres- 
byterian Church,  the  ''New  School"  felt  in  honor  bound 
to  transfer  its  support  from  the  American  Board  through 
which  it  had  maintained  its  foreign  missionary  work  for 
fifty-eight  years.  These  withdrawals  were  viewed  with  regret 
by  all  concerned  in  them;  there  was  nothing  but  good- will 
on  both  sides.  But  those  who  withdrew  felt  that  for  the  devel- 
opment of  their  branches  of  the  Church  and  for  the  larger 
service  of  missions,  the  division  would  result  in  increased 
power.  And  this,  it  is  believed,  has  been  the  result.  As,  by 
an  agreement  made  in  1832,  some  of  the  Board's  missions 
had  been  particularly  assigned  to  the  Dutch  Reformed  Church, 
being  developed  by  men  of  that  communion,  and  in  accord 
with  its  policy,  it  was  a  simple  task,  when  the  division  came, 
to  turn  over  to  this  church  these  missions  in  Amoy  and  Madras. 
The  Presbyterians  took  over  the  Gaboon,  the  Syrian,  and  the 
Nestorian  missions,  as  well  as  work  among  some  of  the  Indian 
tribes,  with  whom  they  had  been  more  closely  associated. 
Despite  the  change,  certain  individuals  of  the  Presbyterian 
Church  maintained  a  lifelong  allegiance  to  the  corporation 
of  the  Board  or  to  the  service  of  some  of  its  missions,  thereby 
enriching  its  fellowship  for  long  years.  To  many  of  the  mis- 
sionaries, who  felt  compelled  to  resign  from  the  Board  in  loyalty 
to  their  church  affiliations,  it  was  a  sore  trial.  Dr.  Calhoun 
of  the  Syrian  Mission,  coming  forward  to  speak  at  the  annual 
meeting  of  1870  in  Chicago,  began,  ''I  am  getting  to  be  an 
old  man;  I  am  losing  my  memory;  I  cannot  remember  that  I 
do  not  belong  to  the  American  Board." 


APPROACHING  MATURITY  311 

The  shrinkage  in  the  Board's  work  thus  threatened  by  the 
withdrawal  of  these  two  influential  bodies  was,  in  the  provi- 
The  dence  of  God,   largely  prevented  by  the   organiza- 

Woman's  tion  of  the  Woman's  Boards  of  Missions,  the  most 
Boards  significant  event  on  the  home  field  during  this 
period.  From  the  days  of  Ann  Haseltine  and  Harriet  Atwood, 
women  had  shared  with  men  the  perils  and  labors  of  the  mis- 
sion field,  and  unmarried  women  had  been  employed  as  teachers 
in  mission  schools.  More  direct  labors  for  women  were  then 
impossible. 

Through  all  these  years,  also,  women  had  shared  with  men 
in  sustaining  the  missions.  The  earliest  auxiliaries  and  mission 
aid  societies  were  largely  of  women,  as,  for  example,  the  one 
formed  in  Park  Street  Church,  Boston,  in  1823.  Now  the  time 
had  come  to  organize  the  women  of  the  churches  into  an  effective 
agency,  both  for  developing  interest  in  the  home  churches  and 
for  stimulating  the  work  on  the  field.  Stirred  in  part,  at  least, 
by  what  earnest  women  had  accomplished  during  the  Civil 
War  through  the  'Christian  Commission,  and  impelled  by  a 
growing  appreciation  of  the  inexpressible  misery  of  womankind 
in  many  mission  lands,  a  few  great-hearted  Christian  women 
in  Boston  and  vicinity  were  prompted  to  organize  a  society 
auxiliary  to  the  American  Board.  Secretary  Clark,  to  whom 
the  matter  was  broached,  gave  his  cordial  support  to  the 
project.  Misgivings,  criticisms,  and  even  opposition  had  to 
be  overborne,  but  the  faith  and  determination  of  these  women, 
notably  of  Mrs.  Albert  Bowker,  were  not  to  be  daunted.  In 
1868  the  Woman's  Board  of  Missions  was  organized,  with  its 
headquarters  in  Boston  and  Mrs.  Bowker  as  its  first  president. 
Later  in  the  same  year  the  Woman's  Board  of  the  Interior 
was  formed,  with  its  office  at  Chicago;  five  years  afterward 
appeared  the  Woman's  Board  of  the  Pacific,  with  the  states 
west  of  the  Rocky  Mountains  as  its  territory,  and  its  headquar- 
ters at  Oakland,  California. 

At  once  upon  the  organization  of  these  Boards,  it  seemed 


312  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

that  new  opportunities  were  discovered  for  their  ministry. 
"The  unity  of  the  Spirit's  work  was  recognized  in  that  no 
sooner  did  the  women  in  America  begin  to  do  their  duty  toward 
their  sisters  in  other  lands  than  the  women  there  began  to 
cry,  'Give  us  the  bread  of  Ufe.'"  By  tours  among  the  women 
of  the  villages,  as  in  Turkey;  by  the  visits  of  Bible  readers  to 
women  in  their  homes,  as  in  India;  by  maintaining  girls'  schools 
and  seminaries  of  distinctive  excellence,  and,  at  length,  by 
starting  hospitals  and  dispensaries  in  which  women  should 
care  for  their  sisters,  they  enlarged  and  enriched  the  work  of 
the  American  Board  in  all  its  fields.  And  by  the  energy  and 
skill  with  which  they  organized  the  women  at  home  and  sys- 
tematized the  gathering  of  funds,  they  attained  a  success  in 
administering  their  work  which  has  provoked  the  admiration, 
not  to  say  the  envy,  of  the  American  Board  itself. 

The  receipts  of  the  Board  for   1850  were  $251,862.21;  for 
1880,  $613,539.51.     One  might  think  that  in  this  period  there 

could  have  been  no  problem  of  finance.  But  these 
P  .  figures  hardly  tell  the  story.     The  receipts  for  1850 

were  unusually  small,  while  those  for  1880  marked 
an  increase  of  $100,000  over  the  amount  of  the  year  before, 
due  to  the  receipt  of  a  phenomenally  large  legacy.  The  fact  is 
that  through  all  these  years  the  question  of  ways  and  means  was 
an  anxious  problem  for  the  Board's  administration.  Secretary 
Anderson,  in  a  special  report  read  at  the  annual  meeting  in 
1859,  just  before  the  jubilee  year,  brought  out  the  fact  that 
in  thirty  out  of  the  forty-nine  years  of  its  existence,  the  Board 
had  been  obliged  to  report  a  debt;  not  that  its  expenses  had 
exceeded  its  income  in  all  these  years;  in  many  cases  it  had 
merely  carried  along  a  debt  that  had  been  incurred  before. 
There  had  been  on  the  whole  an  upward  tendency;  every 
four  years,  with  one  exception,  had  marked  an  increase  in 
receipts.  The  difficulty  had  been  that  with  the  rapid  growth 
of  the  missions  and  the  consequent  increase  in  cost,  the  receipts 
had  not  grown  correspondingly.     But  if  missions  were  to  be 


APPROACHING  MATURITY  313 

maintained,  provision  must  be  made  for  growth  and  develop- 
ment as  well  as  for  planting. 

The  fluctuation  of  receipts  was  often  a  surprise  and  disap- 
pointment. It  seemed  as  though  every  gain  must  be  followed 
by  a  loss..  In  1857  a  fine  showing  was  made;  a  debt  of  $36,000 
was  paid  off;  the  missionary  packet,  the  Morning  Star,  was 
built,  launched,  and  sent  out,  with  a  surplus  in  the  treasury 
to  maintain  her  for  a  year;  expenditures  for  missions  were 
moderately  increased,  and  the  year  closed  with  only  a  small 
deficit,  due  to  special  expenses  in  the  Turkish  missions.  But 
the  next  year  the  Board  had  to  report  a  debt  again,  due  in 
part  to  financial  disturbances  at  home  and  abroad,  but,  in 
part,  to  causes  not  adequately  explained. 

The  jubilee  year,  1860,  was  marked  by  the  extinguishing  of 
that  debt  and  a  resolution  to  have  no  more.  The  annual 
meeting  planned  to  raise  not  less  than  $400,000  to  celebrate 
the  semi-centennial;  there  was  great  enthusiasm;  outbursts 
of  song  by  the  congregation;  a  scene  long  to  be  remembered. 
Yet  the  next  year,  at  the  advent  of  the  rebellion,  a  debt  was 
reported  of  nearly  $28,000. 

The  marvel  of  the  Board's  financial  history  during  the  period 
of  the  war  has  been  already  remarked.  Notwithstanding  the 
debt  at  the  outset,  in  that  dubious  year  of  1862,  all  expenses 
were  met  and  the  deficit  reduced  by  more  than  one-half. 
In  1863,  when  there  was  an  average  advance  of  thirty-five 
per  cent  in  the  price  of  gold,  the  deficit  was  again  cut  in  two, 
while  in  1864,  darker  than  any  of  the  earlier  years,  and  when, 
in  spite  of  strictest  economy,  the  expenses  of  the  missions 
mounted  up  beyond  all  expectation,  by  unprecedented  gifts 
both  in  the  homeland  and  from  abroad,  the  expenses  of  the 
year  were  met,  the  deficit  wiped  out,  and  a  small  balance 
left  in  the  treasury.  The  contributions  of  August,  1864, 
nearly  $135,000,  were  greater  than  in  any  two  months  of  pre- 
ceding years.  The  amounts  acknowledged  that  year  from 
foreign    lands,    including    gifts    from    the    Sandwich    Islands, 


314  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

China,  and  India,  were  over  $18,000.  The  help  of  the  West 
now  began  to  be  felt,  gifts  from  this  section  increasing  more 
than  one  hundred  per  cent  during  the  two  years  from  1862 
to  1864.  In  1861-62  the  donations  from  some  of  the  central 
Western  states  were  as  follows:  from  Iowa,  $551;  from  Missouri, 
$334;  from  Minnesota,  $227;  from  Kansas,  $34;  from  Nebraska, 
$2. 

A  temporary  decline  in  gifts  followed  the  closing  of  the  war, 
yet  the  receipts  were  for  some  time  sufficient  to  keep  the  Board 
in  good  financial  condition.  By  the  bequest  of  $100,000  from 
Anson  G.  Phelps,  at  that  time  the  largest  legacy  ever  received 
by  the  Board,  and  from  which  $10,000  was  paid  annually  into 
the  Board's  treasury,  it  was  possible  to  report  a  small  surplus 
in  1868  and  a  larger  one  in  1872.  The  annual  meeting  of 
that  year  was  held  at  New  Haven;  for  the  first  time  since  the 
Board  met  at  the  same  place,  twenty-six  years  before,  the 
treasurer  could  report  so  considerable  a  balance  as  $8993. 

Notwithstanding  so  good  a  report,  it  was  soon  apparent 
that  the  income  of  the  Board  was  not  keeping  up  with  the 
necessities  of  its  work.  Though  six  missions  had 
^   ..  been  transferred  to  the  Presbyterians  in  1870,  three 

new  fields  in  Papal  Lands  had  been  added;  as  doors 
opened  wider  in  the  older  missions  the  attempt  had  been 
made  to  enter;  there  had  been  an  increase  of  one  hundred 
in  the  missionary  force  and  corresponding  enlargement  on 
the  field,  yet  with  no  gain  in  the  average  annual  receipts  of 
the  Board.  The  withdrawal  of  the  Presbyterians,  taking  off  a 
third  of  the  constituency  of  the  Board,  the  failure  to  produce 
the  extra  offerings  promised  for  the  missions  in  Papal  Lands, 
and  two  colossal  fires  —  in  Chicago  and  Boston  —  accounted  in 
part  for  the  standstill  in  the  treasury.  Under  such  circimi- 
stances  the  policy  of  entering  open  doors  could  not  be  long 
continued.  Deficits  appeared  and  increased  from  year  to 
year,  save  as  they  were  met  by  special  contributions,  as  at 
the  memorable  annual  meeting  in  Providence,  where,   under 


APPROACHING  MATURITY  315 

the  lead  of  Ex-Governor  Page,  of  Vermont,  with  great  enthu- 
siasm, and  in  less  than  one  hour,  $48,000  was  pledged.  The 
relief  which  came  with  the  removal  of  this  heavy  drag  of  debt 
produced  a  scene  without  parallel  in  the  Board's  meetings. 
After  the  singing  of  the  Doxology  and  a  prayer  of  thanks- 
giving there  were  demonstrations  of  uncontrollable  joy;  laugh- 
ing, singing,  waving  of  hats,  and  bursts  of  applause.  The 
dismay  was  correspondingly  great  when  at  next  year's  meeting, 
in  Milwaukee,  it  appeared  that,  in  spite  of  this  deliverance 
and  the  vote  to  raise  $500,000  for  current  work  that  year, 
the  receipts  were  actually  the  smallest  for  many  years  and, 
after  a  sharp  curtailment  of  expenditures,  had  left  a  new 
deficit  of  some  $4500.  It  was  apparent  that  still  further 
reductions  must  be  faced.  The  enthusiasm  of  pubhc  meetings 
could  not  be  relied  upon  as  a  basis  for  appropriations.  The 
expenditures  must  be  brought  down  to  the  receipts.  The 
hearts  of  all  who  cared  for  the  work  at  home  and  abroad  were 
made-  very  heavy. 

The  situation  was  the  more  difficult   because  the    United 

States  were  then  laboring  to  restore   specie   payments.     The 

inflated   values   of   war   times  were   succeeded   by 

D^kSk^     heavy    shrinkage;    the    country   felt   poor;    it   had 

little  to  give. 

The  year  1877-78  was  one  of  the  severest  stringency  which 
the  missionaries  had  so  far  known.  War  and  pestilence  were 
raging  on  some  of  the  fields.  Hopes  raised  by  the  Providence 
meeting  had  been  dashed  by  the  record  of  the  year  since. 
Heavy  retrenchments  must  now  be  made  heavier.  The  depres- 
sion on  the  field  and  at  home  was  intense;  the  administration 
was  desperate  to  know  what  to  do;  the  question  of  abandon- 
ing the  recently  undertaken  missions  to  Papal  Lands  was 
being  considered. 

Then  upon  a  day  in  March,  1879,  when  the  year  was  at  its 
darkest,  word  came  to  the  Board  Rooms  of  a  legacy  of  about 
$1,000,000  from  Asa  Otis,  of  New  London,  Connecticut,  a  quiet 


316  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

but  careful  observer  of  the  Board's  work,  who  had  read  for 
years  the  Missionary  Herald,  and  who  had  come  to  have  thor- 
ough confidence  in  the  pohcy  and  business  management  of 
the  Board.  The  reaction  at  this  news  was  tremendous.  The 
burdened  officers  were  almost  bewildered  by  the  change  in 
situation.  Within  twenty-four  hours  the  good  news  was 
carried  at  lightning  speed  to  every  mission  of  the  Board,  an- 
nouncing immediate  relief  for  the  most  pressing  needs.  For 
several  years  the  word  "retrenchment"  was  no  more  heard, 
though  such  economical  use  of  the  great  gift  was  sought  as 
should  insure  getting  with  it  the  most  and  the  best.  At  the 
annual  meeting  in  1879  it  was  voted  that  of  the  amount  of 
the  Otis  bequest  not  yet  expended,  one-third  be  devoted  to 
the  important  educational  work  of  the  Board,  with  reference 
especially  to  the  training  of  a  native  ministry;  one-third  to 
the  needed  enlargement  of  present  fields  through  evangelistic 
efforts,  and  the  remaining  third  to  missionary  exploration  and 
the  establishment  and  partial  support  of  new  missions,  giving 
the  first  place  to  Central  Africa. 

The  pressure  of  financial  needs  throughout  this  period 
was  reflected  in  all  the  Board's  utterances  and  deliberations. 
Broadening  At  the  annual  meetings  the  ever-recurring  subjects 
the  Home  of  discussion  were  how  to  increase  missionary  zeal 
Base  in  the  churches,  how  to  administer  the  funds  most 

economically,  and  in  what  way  to  secure  that  support  which 
would  make  the  income  match  the  necessarily  increasing  expend- 
iture. A  notable  paper  by  Secretary  Anderson,  in  1861,  on 
''Economy  and  Curtailment  in  Missions,"  eai'ly  exposed  the 
folly  of  abandoning  missions  in  order  to  retrench;  nothing 
could  be  gained  by  cutting  down  expenses  to  what  a  timid 
piety  would  consider  within  the  easy  convenience  of  the 
churches,  which  greatly  need  a  system  of  missions  large  enough 
and  costly  enough  to  challenge  their  best  efforts.  It  was 
also  to  be  recognized  that  the  Board  had  a  work  to  do  in  this 
land  as  well  as  abroad;  part  of  its  purpose  was  to  diffuse  intelli- 


APPROACHING  MATURITY  317 

gence  and  to  awaken  and  sustain  missionary  interest  and 
spirit  in  the  churches. 

During  war  times  a  careful  examination  was  made  of  all 
departments,  and  even  items  of  expenditure,  when  it  appeared 
that  ninety-four  per  cent  of  the  income  from  all  sources  was 
being  expended  directly  in  the  support  of  missionaries  and  in 
sustaining  missions.  To  curtail  expenses,  the  Journal  and 
Dayspring  was  discontinued  in  1861,  with  the  purpose  of 
making  "freer  use"  of  the  rehgious  and  secular  press  for  spread- 
ing missionary  news.  The  Missionary  Herald  at  this  time 
had  attained  a  circulation  of  30,000  copies,  the  high-water 
mark  in  its  history.  The  large  number  of  copies  distributed 
without  charge  kept  it  from  becoming  self-supporting  then, 
as  ever  since.  Yet  its  service  in  informing  and  stimulating 
the  Board's  supporters  approved  it  as  an  indispensable  agency. 

The  intimate  relation  between  the  American  Board  and  the 
churches,  often  unrecognized  in  the  early  days,  was  now  so  gen- 
erally accepted  that  there  was  less  need  of  a  large  number  of 
agencies.  By  the  close  of  this  period  such  agencies  were 
reduced  to  two  district  secretaryships,  one  for  the  Middle 
District,  with  offices  in  New  York;  the  other  for  the  District 
of  the  Interior,  with  headquarters  in  Chicago.  The  local  and 
district  auxiliary  societies  had  dropped  out  of  sight,  and  the 
appeal  of  the  Board  was  made  to  the  churches  directly,  or 
through  their  district  and  state  associations.  The  institutions 
of  the  local  church,  its  Sunday-schools,  missionary  societies, 
and  regular  church  services  were  now  directly  approached. 
The  concert  of  prayer  had  become  a  recognized  force  in  devel- 
oping missionary  knowledge  and  interest  in  the  churches. 
At  the  annual  meeting  of  1869,  900  churches  reported  them- 
selves as  observing  this  monthly  concert. 

It  was  during  this  period,  also,  that  the  annual  meetings, 
which  at  the  first  were  purely  business  sessions,  so  increased 
in  size  and  pubHc  interest  as  to  make  the  business  quite  sub- 
ordinate in  popular  thought  to  the  inspirational  features.     All 


318  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

these  assemblies  were  now  significant;  some  of  them  left  indel- 
ible impress  upon  all  present.  The  meeting  at  Cincinnati,  in 
1853,  was  the  first  beyond  the  AUeghanies,  and  called  forth 
a  paper  by  one  of  the  secretaries  on  the  ''Relation  of  the  West 
to  Foreign  Missions,"  in  which  the  daring  prophecy  was  ven- 
tured that  occasional  visits  might  be  made  to  more  distant 
states !  The  semi-centennial  meeting  at  Boston,  in  1860,  was 
a  jubilee  indeed,  with  the  clearing  away  of  debt,  thanksgiving 
over  what  had  been  accomplished,  and  the  kindling  outlook 
upon  the  next  half-century,  dimmed  only  by  the  apprehensions 
of  the  war  so  soon  to  break.  The  rejoicings  over  the  close 
of  the  war  in  1865  were  celebrated  at  the  first  annual  meeting 
held  in  Chicago,  a  city  which  ten  years  before  was  only  looming 
on  the  horizon.  The  meeting  at  Rutland,  in  1874,  where 
Neesima  and  his  Doshisha  won  all  hearts,  and  the  one  at 
Providence,  in  1877,  where  the  crushing  debt  was  lifted,  were 
other  memorable  occasions  of  this  period. 

The  most  significant  event  of  general  character  in  the  man- 
agement of   the  missions  during  this   period  was  the  sending 

of  a  deputation  to  India  and  Ceylon  in  1854-55,  as 
°^  ^,         described  in  Chapter  IX.     The  inquiries  which  this 

deputation  undertook  covered  practically  all  the 
questions  of  mission  administration:  the  place  and  method 
of  education;  the  creation  and  development  of  the  native 
church;  native  leadership;  the  worth  of  other  mission  agencies, 
such  as  the  press,  the  hospital,  and  the  industrial  school.  It 
was  a  large  undertaking,  conducted  on  a  large  scale  and  with 
far-reaching  results,  as  it  led  in  one  line  to  a  revolution  in 
mission  policy  and  in  another  to  as  marked  a  change  in  the 
ecclesiastical  constitution  of  the  missions.  The  deputation's 
instructions  called  for  such  conference  with  the  missions  as 
might  lead  to  joint  conclusions.  This  conference  feature  was 
perhaps  not  perfectly  carried  out,  inasmuch  as  to  some  of 
the  missionaries  it  appeared  that  the  deputation  came  to  the 
discussions  with  opinions  largely  predetermined.     But  though 


APPROACHING  MATURITY  319 

there  was  not  unanimous  agreement  either  on  the  mission 
field  or  in  the  Board's  councils  at  home,  the  recommendations 
of  the  deputation  were  finally  adopted  and  promptly  put 
in  execution.  The  narrative  of  events  during  this  period  in 
India  and  Ceylon;  in  Turkey,  also,  and,  indeed,  to  some  extent, 
in  all  the  missions  of  the  Board,  as  the  new  policy  was  extended 
to  them  all,  has  shown  the  results  of  the  changed  methods  on 
the  life  of  these  missions. 

That  the  restrictions  upon  higher  education  were  unwise 
and  even  intolerable  is  manifest  from  the  fact  that  during 
this  period  the  principle  was  reversed,  and  schools  and  colleges 
for  higher  education  on  a  yet  broader  basis  were  again  estab- 
lished in  many  of  these  lands.  By  1875  Jaffna  College  was 
in  full  operation,  with  as  many  as  seventy  students;  Central 
Turkey  College  at  Aintab  had  just  secured  its  charter  and 
was  opening  its  preparatory  courses;  other  higher  institutions 
were  in  near  prospect  in  Eastern  Turkey  and  Japan.  Secretary 
Clark,  who  followed  Dr.  Anderson  as  foreign  secretary,  was 
soon  prepared  to  affirm:  ''The  history  of  missions  has  shown 
that  for  the  development  of  a  Christian  community,  whose 
membership  should  be  vigorous  and  self-reliant,  competent 
to  support  and  advance  the  religious  institutions  necessary 
for  a  permanent  Christian  civilization,  some  broader  view  of 
the  education  required  must  be  adopted.  The  experience  of 
the  Board  in  the  Sandwich  Islands,  and  also  in  India,  after 
thirty  and  more  years  of  missionary  labor  there,  is  sufficient 
to  illustrate  the  inadequacy  of  this  early  view  of  missionary 
education." 

Meanwhile,  other  items  of  the  new  policy,  particularly  those 
touching  the  relation  between  the  missions  and  the  native 
Christians,  were  being  abundantly  justified.  The  new  insist- 
ence upon  native  responsibility,  both  in  the  establishment  of 
independent  churches  and  in  the  use  of  native  preachers  and 
teachers,  is  in  a  large  degree  accountable  for  the  substantial 
development  of   the  Board's  work  on  the  field,  and  for  the 


320  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

prestige  it  has  won  among  the  foreign  missionary  societies  of 
the  world.  Yet  it  was  slow  work  to  establish  the  policy  upon 
mission  ground.  So  as  late  as  1862  but  thirty  of  the  140 
churches  connected  with  the  missions  of  the  Board  had  native 
pastors.  The  missionaries  found  many  difficulties  in  the  way 
of  establishing  native  leadership;  often  they  were  not  without 
misgivings  about  trusting  weak  and  inexperienced  disciples 
with  authority.  Yet  experience  showed  that  in  every  land 
responsibility  developed  capacity  and  devotion;  in  spite  of 
some  unfortunate  experiences,  the  general  result  was  good. 

Secretary  Anderson  held  to  his  conviction  and  pressed  the 
application  of  it  upon  all  the  missions.  Self-governing  churches 
must  be  urged  to  self-support.  Only  in  exceptional  cases 
should  they  be  helped  in  the  building  of  their  churches.  The 
native  church  and  ministry  were  to  be  honored  as  of  equal 
standing,  ecclesiastically,  with  the  home  churches  and  min- 
istry. The  paternal  relation  of  the  missionary  to  the  native 
pastors  must  be  regarded  only  as  temporary  and  incidental. 
They  were  in  theory,  and  as  soon  as  possible  should  be  in 
practise,  brethren  and  co-workers.  By  1875  the  native  pas- 
torate was  fully  recognized  by  the  Board  and  all  its  missions 
as  essential;  in  many  missions  its  help  had  come  to  be  accepted, 
not  only  in  preaching,  but  in  counsel  and  administration. 
Often  the  natives  became  more  effective  preachers  than  the 
missionaries.  In  some  fields  it  began  to  be  seen  that  the  work 
of  the  missionaries  was  rapidly  becoming  that  of  preparation 
and  direction  of  native  agents.  By  the  end  of  the  period 
proper  pastoral  work  had  been  in  certain  cases  largely  trans- 
ferred to  native  hands. 

The  move  toward  self-support  was  greatly  stimulated  by  its 
advocacy  at  Harpoot.  Mr.  Wheeler's  volume.  Ten  Years  on 
the  Euphrates,  marked  an  epoch  in  the  progress  of  this  policy. 
Received  at  first  with  comparatively  little  favor  by  missionaries, 
as  by  the  Board  at  home,  it  soon  became  better  appreciated, 
till  at  length  its  claim  was  accepted  as  the  just  principle  upon 


CYRUS    HAMLIN 

Turkey,  1839-1859 


SAMUEL    B.    FAIRBANK 

India,  1846-1898 


TITUS    COAN 

Sandwich  Islands, 
1835-1870 


ELIZA    AGNEW 

Ceylon,   1840-1883 


STEPHEN    R.    RIGGS 

Sioux  Indians, 
1837-1883 


JOHN    L.    STEPHENS 

Mexico,  1872-1874 


MARQUIS    L,    GORDON 

Japan,   1872-1899 


REPRESENTATIVE   MISSIONARIES    (Later) 


APPROACHING  MATURITY  321 

which  church  Hfe  was  to  be  developed  in  all  lands.  The  results 
attained  were  varied  in  different  missions,  according  to  the 
circumstances  of  the  people.  In  the  last  half  of  this  period 
genuine  and  substantial  progress  was  made  in  this  direction. 
Madura,  where  little  had  been  done  toward  self-support  and 
a  native  ministry  up  to  1865,  had  in  1875  eighteen  native 
pastors,  supported  from  a  common  fund;  in  the  Marathi  Mis- 
sion native  Christians  were  believed  to  be  in  the  matter  of 
giving  fully  up  to  the  standard  of  New  England  Congregational- 
ists;  Hawaiian  churches  during  this  decade  contributed  $50,000 
for  home  and  foreign  missions;  while  the  churches  in  Micro- 
nesia received  no  pecuniary  aid  'from  the  Board.  Self-reliance 
was  further  inculcated  in  most  of  the  missions  by  the  adoption 
of  tuition  charges  for  the  schools  and  by  the  withdrawal  of 
the  Board  more  and  more  from  the  work  of  printing  and  pub- 
lication where  it  was  possible  to  turn  over  this  department  of 
work  to  native  enterprise.  At  the  end  of  the  first  ten  years 
of  this  period  the  Board  had  diminished  its  printing  estab- 
lishments from  ten  to  five;  in  the  Sandwich  Islands,  Con- 
stantinople, Bombay,  and  Ceylon,  other  means  of  printing 
were  provided. 

The  securing  of  recruits  in  this  generation  was  almost  as 

serious  a  question  as  that  of  securing  funds.     The  number 

of  ordained  missionaries  in  the  field  was  actually 

.    '      one  less  at  the  end  of  the  period  than  at  the  begin- 

sionanes  T  c    •      i  ^     i 

ning,  and  though  the  number  of  single  women  had 

increased  almost  fivefold,  largely  in  consequence  of  the  organ- 
ization of  the  Woman's  Boards,  the  foreign  agency  in  the 
conduct  of  the  missions  was  hardly  holding  its  own. 

In  this  second  generation  of  missionary  work  the  care  of 
its  missionaries  in  the  homeland,  as  well  as  on  the  field,  became 
an  increasing  concern  of  the  Board.  The  disabling  of  many 
of  the  veterans,  the  necessities  of  widows  of  missionaries, 
together  with  perplexing  questions  as  to  providing  for  the 
education  of  missionaries'  children,  were  subjects  of  repeated 


322  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

discussion  and  action  at  the  annual  meetings.  What  was 
evident  through  all  was  the  purpose  of  the  Board  to  provide 
for  the  needs  of  its  missionaries  and  their  families  as  sym- 
pathetically and  helpfully  as  might  be.  It  was  in  this  period 
that  Mrs.  Eliza  Walker,  herself  the  widow  of  a  missionary,  and 
with  children  of  her  own  to  train,  began  to  receive  into  her 
home  at  Auburndale,  Massachusetts,  the  children  of  other 
missionaries  coming  to  this  country  for  education,  and  thus 
laid  the  foundation  of  the  Walker  Missionary  Home,  after- 
ward by  her  care  to  become  a  house  of  blessing  to  a  host  of 
missionaries  and  their  families,  and  the  prototype  of  the 
similar  Tank  Home  at  Oberlin,  Ohio. 

With  the  care  of  missionary  children  in  mind,  it  is  an  impress- 
ive fact  to  note  that  in  almost  every  mission  of  the  Board 
there  were,  even  in  this  second  period,  children  or  grandchil- 
dren of  missionaries  who  had  returned  to  missionary  work 
in  the  land  of  their  parents'  adoption  and  of  their  own  birth. 

The  relations  between  the  missionaries  and  the  Board  through- 
out this  period  are  well  indicated  by  Dr.  Goodell  in  his  fare- 
well letter:  "One  thing  is  certain,  viz.,  were  I  to  live  my  life 
over  again,  and  were  it  left  to  my  choice,  I  would  again  enter 
the  service  of  the  American  Board;  I  would  again  put  myself 
under  the  direction  of  the  same  Prudential  Committee;  and  I 
would  again  choose  to  carry  on  my  correspondence  with  the 
churches  through  the  same  beloved  and  respected  secretaries." 


THE   INCREASE,    1880-1910 


Mexican  Mission     -^ 

Same  Scale  as  Main  Map 


Chapter  XVIII 

A  PERIOD  OF  EXPANSION 

With  the  opening  of  its  seventh  decade  the  American  Board 
entered  upon  a  period  of  quick  enlargement.     In  what  mere 

figures   show  the   ratio   of   growth   was   greater   in 

n  ncome     ^^^^  ^^^^  ^^^  decades;  infancy  is  usually  the  time 

and  Outgo  '.        •  t^    .    -j-  -        t.-i 

of  most  rapid  mcrease  m  size.     But  it  in  physical 

proportions  its  largest  gains  were  earlier,  as  the  Board 
approached  maturity  it  suddenly  acquired  new  strength  and 
efficiency.  The  impetus  came  with  the  Otis  legacy  in  1879. 
As  described  in  the  preceding  chapter,  that  gift  changed  the 
whole  face  of  the  Board's  sky.  An  amendment  to  the  Board's 
charter  was  made  necessary  to  allow  it  to  ho^d  larger  funds. 
The  limit,  first  set  at  $4000  income  from  real  estate  and 
$8000  from  personal  property,  which  limit  had  been  enlarged 
in  1863,  was  now  advanced  to  $2,000,000  personal  estate  and 
$1,000,000  real.  Before  the  Board  and  its  constituency  had 
hardly  adjusted  themselves  to  the  new  situation  there  came, 
five  years  later,  another  bequest  of  nearly  $600,000  from  the 
estate  of  Samuel  W.  Swett  of  Jamaica  Plain,  Massachusetts, 
whose  commercial  interests  in  the  Pacific  Ocean,  which  his 
vessels  traversed,  had  impressed  him  with  the  good  work 
accomplished  by  the  missionaries  of  the  American  Board  in 
the  Sandwich  Islands.  It  was  possible  now  more  adequately 
to  maintain  the  missions  that  had  outgrown  their  resources 
and  to  answer  some  of  the  clamorous  calls  for  advance. 

The  projects  to  which  Mr.  Otis'  bequest  was  apportioned 
were  at  once  undertaken.  By  1882  five  new  missions  had 
been  started;  in  1884  another  was  added,  altogether  a  more 

325 


326  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

rapid  enlargement  of  its  field  than  had  before  occurred  in  the 
history  of  the  Board.  Though  begun  so  promptly  and  strongly, 
this  line  of  expansion  did  not  make  advance  enough  for  some 
time  to  cause  heavy  inroads  upon  the  fund  assigned  for  the 
purpose.  But  of  the  thirds  set  aside  for  enlarged  educational 
work  and  for  evangelistic  outreach,  $265,000  had  been  expended 
for  the  former  and  for  the  latter  over  $285,000.  When  the 
Swett  bequest  was  received,  in  1884,  it  was  treated  in  the 
same  fashion  and  designated  largely  to  meet  special  calls  of 
evangelism  and  education,  particularly  in  the  newly  awakening 
empires  of  Japan  and  China. 

As  a  result  of  these  great  benefactions,  receipts  from  living 
donors  fell  off  somewhat;  there  was  a  lessened  rate  of  giving 
for  several  years  thereafter;  yet  it  was  gratifying  to  find  that 
there  was  not  more  general  disposition  to  rest  upon  these 
legacies.  By  1890,  when  they  were  fast  dwindling,  the  burden 
of  the  annual  meetings  became  once  more  the  securing  of 
enlarged  and  extra  gifts  and  the  devising  of  methods  to  fill 
the  needy  treasury.  But  by  that  time  the  Board  was  fairly 
launched  upon  its  broader  and  more  diversified  activities. 

In  the  beginning  it  was  usual  that  each  missionary  should 
do  somewhat  of  all  kinds  of  work.  Later  in  the  larger 
stations  there  came  a  division  of  labor;  gradually 
•°t  ti°^"^"  ^^^^  missionaries  were  set  apart  to  definite  under- 
takings, particularly  translation  and  publication. 
Now  with  the  increase  in  forces  and  equipment  it  became  the 
habit,  both  at  home  and  on  the  field,  to  distinguish  certain 
departments  of  labor.  At  length  five  general  lines  were 
recognized:  evangelistic,  educational,  medical,  industrial,  and 
publishing,  efforts  of  philanthropic  or  social  sort  being  loosely 
grouped  by  themselves. 

By  this  time  the  Board  had  reappraised  its  educational  work 
and  determined  to  provide  Christian  schools,  not  only  for 
adherents,  but  for  all  who  would  attend  them,  and  to  promote 
a  broad  and  general  culture  under  Christian  auspices.     With 


EDUCATIONAL    UNDERTAKINGS 

5 


1  A    GYMNASTIC    CLASS,    PEKING 

2  ALONG    THE    DOSHISHA    CAMPUS 

3  UNION  COLLEGE  OF  ARTS,  TUNG- 

CHOU 

4  AT  THE  COLLEGE  DOOR,  TUNG- 

CHOU 


IN    CHINA    AND    JAPAN 

IN     THE     LABORATORY,     FOOCHOW 

COLLEGE 
A    KYOTO    KINDERGARTEN 
UNION  MEDICAL  COLLEGE,  PEKING 
A   VISTA   AT   KOBE    COLLEGE 


A  PERIOD   OF   EXPANSION  327 

the  distribution  of  $50,000  of  the  Otis  fund  as  endowments  for 
Central  Turkey  College  at  Aintab,  Jaffna  College  in  Ceylon, 
Armenia  College  (then  so  called)  at  Harpoot,  and  through  the 
Woman's  Boards  to  the  trustees  of  the  Constantinople  Home 
for  education  of  wives  for  the  native  ministry,  the  few  colleges 
of  the  Board  already  organized  received  encouraging  recog- 
nition. Others  were  soon  projected  or  begun;  in  all  of  them 
native  teachers  and  professors  were  to  be  found  in  the  faculty, 
tuition  was  required,  and  in  general  native  responsibility  and 
support  was  secured.  In  this  period,  also,  the  whole  educational 
scheme  of  the  missions  was  systematized  from  the  kindergarten 
to  the  post-graduate  school;  in  many  cases  it  was  more  closely 
related  to  the  educational  life  of  the  mission  lands,  as  notably 
in  India. 

In  the  same  way  the  medical  line  was  now  rapidly  developed. 
In  the  early  days  it  was  but  an  incident;  some  ordained  mis- 
sionaries had  also  medical  training  and  were  able  to  take  with 
them  and  use  effectively  a  case  of  medicines;  but  they  were 
not  distinctively  medical  missionaries,  and  they  had  no  such 
equipment  as  would  now  be  thought  necessary  for  the  most 
inadequately  provided  missionary  physician.  Even  in  1880 
there  were  but  thirteen  men  practising  medicine  in  mission 
fields;  of  these,  seven  were  ordained  and  only  six  distinctively 
medical  missionaries.  There  were  then  no  women  engaged  in 
this  service.  At  the  end  of  the  period  there  are  no  less  than 
forty-six  medical  missionaries,  fourteen  of  them  being  women, 
with  twenty-eight  hospitals  and  thirty-seven  dispensaries 
under  their  care. 

The  industrial  department  was  virtually  reorganized,  not 
to  say  reborn,  during  this  period.  It  was  the  early  idea  that 
among  degraded  peoples  industrial  teachers  would  be  needed 
as  sappers  and  miners,  to  prepare  the  way  for  the  constructive 
work  of  the  missions.  Results  on  several  fields  disproved  the 
theory  that  some  measure  of  civilizing  influence  must  precede 
any  effective   attempt  to  Christianize,  whereupon  the  Board 


328  STORY   OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

for  a  time  inclined  to  the  opposite  extreme,  depreciating 
every  other  mission  agency  than  direct  evangelism.  The 
results  of  this  rigid  policy  were  also  disappointing. 

At  length  many  missionaries  in  various  fields  began  to 
introduce  certain  lines  of  industry  as  a  means  of  helping  students 
to  earn  their  support  or  as  furnishing  relief  work  in  times  of 
famine  or  plague.  Yet  in  1880  the  industrial  department 
was  still  in  its  experimental  stage. 

In  1893,  in  a  paper  dealing  with  industrial  education  as 
one  of  "Two  Unsolved  Mission  Problems,"  Secretary  Clark 
pointed  out  that  it  had  been  steadily  coming  to  the  front  for 
some  years  and  that  missionaries  without  endorsement  or 
formal  encouragement  had  begun  industrial  schools  in  at  least 
a  half  dozen  fields  of  the  Board.  But  while  such  education 
was,  in  the  main,  for  providing  self-help  for  students,  many 
missionary  societies  were  looking  toward  a  wider  activity  in 
this  line  in  order  to  prepare  the  way  for  self-supporting  Chris- 
tian communities.  In  Turkey,  for  example,  it  was  found  that 
"the  best  work  yet  done  by  any  native  pastors  or  preachers 
has  been  done  by  men  who  were  trained  to  industrial  habits 
and  pursuits  at  the  Bebek  Seminary  by  Dr.  Hamlin.  The 
young  men  whom  he  brought  together  were  all  taught  some 
useful  occupation  in  connection  with  their  studies.  These 
men  have  made  their  mark  wherever  they  have  gone  through- 
out the  Turkish  empire;  they  have  been  the  strongest  men, 
whether  as  pastors  or  business  laymen,  to  be  found  in  the 
Christian  communities." 

The  development  of  industrial  education  has  been  slow  and 
cautious.  The  expense  involved  in  the  equipment  of  technical 
schools  is  so  great  that  the  Board  would  have  been  unable 
to  carry  this  undertaking  far,  even  if  it  had  so  desired,  and 
many  experiments  in  this  direction  have,  for  one  reason  or 
another,  not  proved  successful.  The  question  is  still  an  un- 
solved problem  though,  by  force  of  necessity  as  well  as  by  the 
impulse  of  broadening  missionary  purposes,  industrial  enter- 


SOME   LINES   OF   EVANGELISM 


1  STREET    PREACHING,    MADURA, 

INDIA 

2  A     BIBLE    READER     OF    TREBI- 

ZOND,    TURKEY 

3  A, "woman's  MEETING    IN  WEST 

AFRICA 


4  TENT    MEETING,    BOMBAY,    INDIA 

5  BOOKSTORE     AND     STREET      CHAPEL, 

PEKING 

6  A  SERVICE    FOR  PATIENTS  AT  CEYLON 

HOSPITAL 


A  PERIOD   OF  EXPANSION  329 

prises  have  gradually  developed  in  the  less  prosperous  or  pro- 
ductive lands  in  which  the  Board  works.  Many  industrial 
plants,  such  as  those  at  Ahmednagar,  Sirur,  and  Bombay  in 
India;  Mount  Silinda  and  Amanzimtoti  in  Africa,  and  at 
stations  in  all  the  Turkish  missions,  are  among  the  potent  and 
hopeful  forces  at  work  in  these  fields. 

Publication  as  a  department  of  the  Board's  activity  has 
not  grown  like  the  others,  inasmuch  as  in  many  fields  the 
Board  has  got  beyond  its  early  need  of  maintaining  presses 
and  a  corps  of  translators  and  writers.  But  as  it  is  associated 
through  actual  cooperation  or  moral  support  with  native 
presses  and  publications,  this  is  still  a  clear  field  of  service  in 
every  mission  where  there  are  regularly  appearing  vernacular 
periodicals,  papers,  pamphlets,  and  magazines,  some  of  them 
with  large  subscription  lists  and  mighty  influence  over  a  wide 
territory,  and  to  which  native  Christian  leaders  as  well  as 
missionaries  contribute.  The  power  of  the  Christian  press 
is  not  less  but  even  greater  than  in  the  earlier  periods.  Dr. 
John  P.  Jones  has  said  that  the  press  is  to-day  the  most  impor- 
tant agency  in  furthering  Christian  thought  in  India. 

The  evangelistic  field  of  missionary  enterprise  is  as  clearly 
marked  and  as  fully  developed  as  the  others.  In  some  lands, 
notably  Japan,  it  is  becoming  the  missionary's  particular  field, 
as  he  goes  out  to  aid  in  proclaiming  the  gospel  through  the 
institutions  and  agencies  belonging  to  the  Christian  communi- 
ties. As  the  native  agency  has  multiplied  so  rapidly  in  this 
period,  there  being  954  preachers  in  1910  against  517  in  1880, 
in  some  cases,  as  in  the  Madura  Mission,  a  regular  part  of  the 
year's  work  is  the  itinerating,  when  missionaries  and  native 
preachers  attempt  to  cover  every  district  in  a  systematic  effort 
to  carry  the  gospel  to  those  who  have  not  heard  it;  in  similar 
tours  the  churches  also  are  visited  for  their  spiritual  upbuilding. 
The  work  of  evangelism  is  as  distinct  and  fundamental  a  part  of 
missionary  labor  in  this  period  as  ever,  while  the  other  depart- 
ments are  felt  to  serve  the  same  end  as  really  if  not  so  directly. 


330  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

It  looked  for  a  time  as  though  the  Board's  constitu- 
ency would  diminish  rather  than  increase  during  the  '80s, 
In  Com-  because  of  what  was  popularly  known  as  the 
prehen-  ^'Andover  controversy."  The  mooted  point  with 
siveness  the  Board  was  whether  its  missionaries  should  be 
required  to  affirm  their  disbelief  in  the  theory  of  probation 
after  death.  A  vote  was  passed  at  the  annual  meeting  of 
1886  in  Des  Moines,  lamenting  the  tendency  of  this  theory, 
and  cautioning  the  Prudential  Committee  to  guard  the  Board 
from  committing  itself  to  a  doctrine  judged  to  be  divisive, 
perversive,  and  dangerous.  It  was  not  until  1893  that  the 
issue  thus  started  finally  disappeared  from  the  Board's  plat- 
form and  not  until  some  years  later  that  its  disturbing  effects 
had  subsided. 

During  this  time  of  public  controversy  there  was  consider- 
able shifting  of  ground  and  change  of  attack.  For  several 
years  the  conservatives  were  strongly  in  the  majority,  while 
the  positive  and  uncompromising  attitude  of  the  Home  Secre- 
tary maintained  the  policy  which  the  annual  meetings  renewedly 
approved.  The  conservatives  feared  the  consequences  of  toler- 
ating the  theory  in  dispute,  by  which,  they  said,  the  nerve  of 
missions  would  be  cut.  The  progressives  pleaded  for  freedom : 
the  Board  should  not  assume  the  place  of  an  ecclesiastical 
council;  there  should  be  the  same  liberty  for  missionaries 
abroad  as  for  ministers  at  home;  whoever  was  acceptable  to 
the  churches  here  should  be  acceptable  for  service  in  the  foreign 
field. 

The  strain  of  the  time  was  intense.  Personal  factors  com- 
plicated the  situation.  The  controversy  touched  not  only  the 
appointment  of  new  candidates,  but  the  return  to  the  field  of 
missionaries  on  furlough  who  declared  their  sympathy  with 
the  new  views.  The  annual  meetings  of  the  Board  lost  their 
wonted  character  and  became  the  scenes  of  brilliant  but 
stormy  and  unhappy  debate.  Moreover,  the  controversy 
resulted  in  some  loss  of  receipts,  although  the  seriousness  of 


A  PERIOD   OF  EXPANSION  331 

the  situation  was  less  marked  in  this  particular  than  in  others. 
There  were  threats  of  separation  and  the  forming  of  another 
missionary  board.  That  such  a  split  did  not  transpire  wit- 
nesses to  the  Christian  loyalty  and  charity  of  those  on  both 
sides  of  the  debate.  Men  were  not  willing  to  deny  the  genuine 
faith  and  missionary  zeal  of  those  from  whom  they  differed. 
Love  of  the  "old  Board"  and  its  work,  and  trust  in  the  spirit 
of  Christ  to  guide  those  sincerely  seeking  to  preach  his  gospel, 
held  together  the  disagreeing  constituency  in  this  time  of  stress. 

In  particular,  the  election  of  Dr.  R.  S.  Storrs  as  president, 
in  1887,  upon  the  death  of  President  Mark  Hopkins,  and  his 
broad-minded  and  mediating  policy,  frankly  announced  and 
impartially  applied,  renewed  confidence  in  the  hearts  of  those 
who  were  trying  to  find  a  fair  solution  of  the  difficulty.  The 
outcome  was  in  close  accord  with  the  position  which  Dr.  Storrs 
took  in  his  letter  of  acceptance  of  the  presidency.  The  Board 
did  not  further  declare  itself  upon  the  vexed  question  of  the- 
ology, which  by  this  time  had  been  relegated  to  the  field  of 
academic  discussion;  it  did  not  put  out  of  its  own  hands  the 
decision  as  to  the  fitness  of  missionary  candidates.  But  it 
did  declare  that  neither  the  Board  nor  its  Committee  was  a 
theological  court,  that  missionaries  were  to  have  the  same 
freedom  of  thought  and  speech  as  their  ministerial  brethren  at 
home,  and  that  private  or  provincial  standards  of  theology 
were  not  to  be  used  as  barriers  in  the  way  of  men  in  other 
respects  qualified  for  missionary  service.  The  heavy  losses, 
both  of  men  and  money,  that  would  naturally  have  flowed 
to  the  Board  in  these  turbulent  years,  purchased  for  it  a 
more  comprehensive  spirit,  and,  we  may  believe,  forever  deter- 
mined that  there  shall  be  room  in  the  Board,  both  in  support 
at  home  and  in  service  abroad,  for  all  who  feel  that  they  are 
called  to  preach  to  the  world  the  redeeming  grace  of  God 
through  Jesus  Christ. 

Among  the  readjustments  which  this  struggle  involved  was 
the  loss  to  the  Board  of  its  home  secretary.  Dr.  Edmund  K. 


332  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

Alden.  Possessed  of  marked  executive  ability,  unusual  gifts 
in  the  discernment  of  character,  untiring  industry,  and  a  loving 
and  kindly  heart,  Dr.  Alden  was  also  able  to  portray  the  mis- 
sionary enterprise  with  memorable  eloquence  and  power.  His 
inflexibility  in  maintaining  the  theological  standards  to  which 
he  committed  himself  and  to  which  he  sincerely  believed 
every  missionary  should  be  as  firmly  committed,  and  the  zeal 
and  adroitness  with  which  he  for  a  time  carried  his  point  in 
the  administration  of  the  Board,  unfortunately  obscured  at 
the  last  a  career  of  distinguished  service. 

The  withdrawal  from  the  same  cause,  in  1893,  of  Dr.  Augustus 
C.  Thompson  and  Mr.  Elbridge  Torrey  deprived  the  Pruden- 
tial Committee  of  two  most  efficient  members,  the  former  its 
chairman.  Dr.  Thompson  had  served  the  longest  term  and, 
with  the  exception  of  Charles  Stoddard,  by  far  the  longest 
term  of  all  those  who  have  been  chosen  to  the  Committee. 
For  more  than  forty-four  years,  or  over  half  the  lifetime  of  the 
Board,  he  had  sat  week  by  week  at  the  Committee's  table 
and  had  rendered  freely  an  amount  of  laborious  and  skilful 
service  such  as  money  could  not  purchase.  As  a  result,  he  was 
easily  the  best  informed  man  on  the  Committee  in  matters 
pertaining  to  the  work,  not  only  of  this  Board,  but  of  all  other 
foreign  missionary  societies.  Clear  in  his  judgments,  frank  in 
the  expression  of  them,  strict  in  his  allegiance  to  the  convic- 
tions which  he  had  carefully  formed,  Dr.  Thompson  was  gra- 
cious in  bearing  and  generous  of  heart,  while  the  flash  of  his 
wit  often  relieved  the  strain  of  discussion  at  the  Committee's 
table. 

Another  result  of  these  years  of  controversy  was  the  read- 
justment of  the  American  Board's  organization  to  relate  it 
more    closely    to    its    constituency.     In    the    theo- 

..  logical  debates  it  was  frequently  charged  that  as 

a  self-perpetuating  corporation  the  Board  was  not 

sufficiently  sensitive  to  the  will  of  the  churches  whose  agent 

it  really  was;  that  it  claimed  the  gifts  of  the  churches  as  con- 


A  PERIOD   OF  EXPANSION  333 

ducting  foreign  missions  for  them,  while  it  managed  its  affairs 
as  an  incorporated  body,  independent  of  their  control.  The 
growing  tendency  among  Congregational  churches,  especially 
those  of  the  West,  toward  a  more  developed  oversight  and 
direction  of  denominational  affairs  by  state  and  national 
organizations,  pointed  the  appeal  that  the  Board  should  attach 
itself  organically  to  the  churches  it  served.  Now  that  other 
denominations,  formerly  working  through  the  Board,  had 
withdrawn,  the  way  was  easier  for  such  readjustment. 

During  these  troubled  years  various  committees  were 
appointed  to  investigate  different  phases  of  the  Board's  organ- 
ization and  action.  As  a  result  of  one  of  these  lines  of  inves- 
tigation, a  plan  was  adopted  in  1894  which,  with  subsequent 
modifications,  provides  for  nomination  to  corporate  member- 
ship by  district  and  state  bodies  of  Congregational  churches. 
The  corporate  membership  has  thus  been  greatly  increased  in 
numbers  during  this  period,  the  limit  being  raised  from  350 
to  500,  and  the  churches  have  now  the  main  responsibility 
in  the  proposal  of  members,  though  the  corporation  itself  has 
the  right  to  nominate  a  certain  proportion  of  new  members 
at  large. 

It  was  during  this  period  of  reconstruction  under  pressure, 
also,  that  the  president  and  vice-president  of  the  Board  were 
made  ex-offidis  members  of  the  Prudential  Committee.  The 
legal  right  of  the  Board  to  elect  women  to  corporate  member- 
ship was  also  established,  but  so  far  has  been  exercised  in  only 
a  few  cases.  The  Canadian  Congregationalists,  as  making 
the  Board  the  mediunl  of  their  foreign  missionary  operations, 
have  been  granted  representation  in  the  corporation,  though 
outside  of  the  national  organization  of  the  Congregational 
churches  to  which  the  Board  is  directly  attached. 

But  the  most  significant  expansion  of  all  in  the.  life  of  the 
American  Board  in  this  period  has  been  the  broadening  of  its 
aim.  In  all  the  periods  of  the  Board's  history  its  missionaries 
have  gone  forth  under  a  strong  sense  of  loyalty  to  Jesus  Christ 


334  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

and  his  great  commission.  But  their  attitude  toward  the  peo- 
ple to  whom  they  have  gone  has  gradually  experienced  a  change 
amounting  almost  to  a  revulsion  of  thought.  The 
In  Aim  early  missionaries  regarded  the  heathen  world  to 
which  they  went  as  utterly  depraved  and  doomed, 
feeding  on  lies  and  clinging  to  religions  that  were  the  invention 
of  the  devil.  They  viewed  both  with  horror  and  with  pity 
the  wretched  people  among  whom  they  made  their  new  home, 
and  set  themselves  with  all  the  ardor  of  their  Christian  faith 
to  snatch  those  whom  they  could  reach  from  the  death  in 
which  they  seemed  already  involved. 

A  closer  acquaintance  with  these  people,  bringing  better 
knowledge  of  their  customs  and  faith,  their  ideals  and  modes 
of  thought,  did  not  lessen  the  sense  of  horror  over  their  condi- 
tion and  of  pity  for  the  bondage  of  superstition  in  which,  in 
all  these  lands,  they  walk  in  darkness.  But  it  did  bring  a 
juster  apprehension  of  the  religious  spirit  underlying  the  crude 
and  mistaken  forms  and  of  some  points  of  truth  and  value 
in  many  of  the  oriental  faiths  to  which  appeal  could  be  made, 
and,  beyond  that,  of  the  potential  strength  of  races  which 
might  be  won  for  the  building  up  of  the  wide  kingdom  of  God 
on  earth. 

Moreover,  the  new  science  and  philosophy  which  had  begun 
to  shape  modern  thought  in  all  other  fields  of  interest  inevi- 
tably affected  missionary  motives  and  aims  as  well.  The 
importance  of  man's  environment,  the  unity  of  his  nature,  in 
which  body  and  spirit  are  combined,  the  influence  of  racial 
and  geographical  elements  as  affecting  character  and  habit, 
these  and  other  new  and  constructive  ideas  in  modern  thought 
have  tended  greatly  to  broaden  the  conception  of  the  mis- 
sionary enterprise.  From  being  what  Dr.  Dennis  has  called 
"a  kind  of  slum  work  among  sunken,  degraded,  and  altogether 
degenerate  races,"  wherein  the  effort  was  in  pity  to  hold  out 
a  helping  hand  to  such  as  would  be  saved,  there  is  now  a  new 
appreciation  both  of  the  value  of  these  belated  nations  and 


A  PERIOD   OF   EXPANSION  335 

of  the  necessity  of  seeking  to  redeem  them  in  order  really  to 
save  the  people  within  them.  The  task  is  recognized  still 
as  primarily  working  for  individuals,  but  now  they  are  con- 
tinually thought  of  and  addressed  as  representatives  of  the 
race  with  whose  life  and  fortunes  they  are  bound,  and  in  the 
regeneration  of  whose  society  and  the  Christianizing  of  whose 
national  life  they  are  to  be  factors.  To  the  awakening,  trans- 
forming, and  equipping  of  these  individuals  both  in  the  interior 
springs  of  their  lives  and  in  their  outer  action,  so  that  they 
may  become  hving  forces  in  the  redemption  of  their  owti 
people,  the  missionary  sets  himself  with  renewed  purpose. 
And  that  Christian  influences  can  be  imparted  to  all  the 
varied  life  of  these  ancient  lands  until  the  customs  and  ideals 
of  their  people  are  penetrated  with  Christian  conceptions  is  the 
great  and  gladsome  hope  that  inspires  the  Board's  missions 
to-day. 


Chapter  XIX 

INTO   NEW  FIELDS 

West  Africa 

When  it  became  possible  to  think  of  entering  upon  new 
fields  the  Board  turned  at  once  toward  Africa.  The  project 
Spying  of  another  mission  in  that  land  was  taken  up  with 

out  the  utmost  care.  Dr.  John  O.  Means,  then  record- 
Land  ing  secretary  of  the  Board  and  soon  to  be  elected 
corresponding  secretary,  was  appointed  to  make  the  investiga- 
tions. His  inquiry  was  painstaking  and  complete,  involving 
not  only  a  study  of  the  literature  on  Africa,  but  consultations 
with  officers  of  other  Boards  in  England  and  on  the  Continent, 
and  with  officials  of  high  importance  in  African  affairs  and  in 
world  politics.  The  report,  presented  to  the  annual  meeting 
of  1879,  was  so  complete  in  its  survey  of  the  land  and  its  mis- 
sionary possibilities  as  to  be  a  document  of  first  importance, 
not  only  for  the  American  Board,  but  for  every  student  of 
Africa. 

The  recommendation  with  which  Dr.  Means'  report  closed 
pointed  to  Bihe,  in  the  province  of  Angola,  on  the  west  coast. 
The  as  on  the  whole  most  nearly  meeting  the  desired 

Location  conditions.  This  location,  some  250  miles  east 
at  Bihe  horn  the  port  of  Benguella,  with  an  elevation  of 
5,000  feet  above  sea-level,  was  accessible,  healthful,  populous, 
and  in  a  potentially  important  field.  Its  tribes  of  vigorous  and 
capable  Africans,  Bihenos,  and  Bailundos,  nominally  under 
Portuguese  jurisdiction,  were  measurably  untouched  as  yet  by 
the  vices  of  the  coast,  with  no  defined  rehgious  system  or  object 
of  worship,  and  wholly  unreached  by  missionary  operations. 

The  Board  promptly  accepted  this  report  and  determined  to 

336 


INTO  NEW  FIELDS  337 

plant  another  mission  in  West  Africa.  The  event  has  fully 
attested  the  wisdom  with  which  the  selection  was  made. 
The  region  has  proved  healthful,  the  people  responsive,  and 
the  chain  of  stations  lies  directly  along  the  line  of  roads  between 
the  coast  and  the  interior.  As  railroads  are  now  being 
built  in  the  province,  it  seems  that  they  are  to  touch  these 
highways  of  travel  which  the  missionaries  chose  and  to  make 
access  to  the  mission  still  easier.  The  Umbundu  speech,  also, 
which  the  missionaries  of  this  Board  were  the  first  to  acquire 
and  reduce  to  written  form,  is  a  leading  dialect  of  the  great 
Bantu  language  and  widely  diffused  throughout  the  interior. 
A  Scotch  missionary  of  a  neighboring  field  has  said  that  Bih6 
cannot  be  overestimated  as  a  center  for  missionary  work;  he  has 
found  its  people  travehng  in  every  direction,  their  word  every- 
where believed;  it  is  his  conviction  that  a  more  enterprising  tribe 
of  men  does  not  exist  in  all  central  and  southern  Africa. 

The  first  missionaries  were  sent  out  in  1880:  Rev.  Walter  W. 
Bagster,  an  Englishman  of  the  family  associated  with  the 
The  First  famous  Bible  publishing  house;  Rev.  William  H. 
Mission-  Sanders,  son  of  American  Board  missionaries  in 
aries  Ceylon,  where  he  himself  was  born,  and  Mr.  Samuel 

T.  Miller,  son  of  a  freedman  in  Virginia,  educated  at  Hampton 
Institute,  unordained  but  fitted,  it  was  believed,  to  be  of 
special  service  in  the  establishment  of  work  in  Africa.  The 
party  landed  at  Benguella  in  the  middle  of  November,  and 
were  civilly  treated  by  the  Portuguese  authorities.  But  the 
customary  delays  and  difficulties  in  dealing  with  the  easy- 
going natives  made  it  a  wearisome  and  vexatious  task  to 
secure  porters  and  prepare  for  the  inland  journey. 

After  many  disappointments  at  last  they  got  started  on 
.  their  slow  and  adventurous  journey  of  three  weeks, 

the  Field  ^^^'  ^^^^^  many  vicissitudes,  arrived  at  Bailundu, 
only  a  short  distance  from  Bihe,  March  28,  1881. 
It  was  a  picturesque  procession  that  wound  into  this  Afri- 
can village.    Beasts  of  burden  not  being  available,  the  loads 


338  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

were  carried  by  porters,  and  the  travelers  either  had  to  walk 
or  be  carried,  African  fashion,  in  tepoias  suspended  from 
poles  on  men's  shoulders.  Mr.  Bagster,  who  had  already 
suffered  much  from  coast  fever,  rode  an  ox;  Messrs.  Sanders 
and  Miller,  who  started  in  tepoias,  walked  most  of  the  way; 
then  there  were  seven  donkeys  taken  for  use  in  the  interior, 
and  some  sixty  natives,  each  carrying  a  load  of  about  sixty 
pounds.  Including  all  the  c^mp  followers,  ninety-five  persons 
were  in  the  company.  The  party  was  cordially  received  by 
Kwikwi,  king  of  Bailundu,  who  fairly  compelled  them  to 
remain  there  as  his  "children,"  although  the  king  of  Bih6  was 
likewise  eager  for  their  coming  and  had  even  sent  out  his 
''secretary  of  state"  to  extend  his  hospitality.  With  the 
coming  of  reenforcements  in  the  next  two  years,  including  a 
skilled  mechanic  and  teacher  and  a  medical  missionary,  it 
became  possible  to  open  a  second  station  at  Kamundongo, 
six  miles  from  the  king's  residence  at  Bihe. 

The  pioneers  were  quickly  established  in  temporary  quar- 
ters and   began  to  make   acquaintance  with  the  people  and 

their  speech.     Soon  they  were  occupied  in  building 
acmg     e    p^i-j^-^^nent  homes,  constructing  a  written  language, 

winning  confidence,  and  beginning  instruction.  In 
1882,  before  work  was  fairly  under  way,  the  mission  was  sad- 
dened and  depleted  by  the  death  of  Mr.  Bagster,  who  suffered 
heavily  from  coast  fever  and  upon  whom  the  labors  and  hard- 
ships connected  with  the  founding  of  the  mission  had  put  a 
harder  strain  than  flesh  could  bear.  The  first  to  offer  himself 
for  the  new  mission,  in  a  sense  its  leader,  combining  rare  good 
sense  and  practical  efficiency  with  a  deep  and  sensitive  spiritual 
nature,  Mr.  Bagster  was  fitted  for  superb  service  in  this 
field.  A  letter  written  to  his  father  shows  the  sense  both  of 
shock  and  appeal  with  which  the  eager  missionary  viewed  the 
raw  heathen:  ''When  the  real,  live,  dirty,  naked  savage  comes 
before  you,  not  in  book  or  letter,  not  in  fancy  or  passing  notice, 
but  under  your  own  eye;  when  you  place  your  hand  upon  his 


INTO   NEW  FIELDS  339 

shoulder  and  feel  the  dirt  and  nakedness:  when  you  turn  that 
man's  face  toward  you.  and  there  you  read  —  *no  good  thing': 
when  the  foulest  pictures,  thoughts,  and  words  fail  to  show 
him  as  he  is,  then,  and  only  then,  you  have  to  go  to  Jesus  for 
faith  to  beheve  that  for  such  Christ  died:  then  you  need  to  be 
very  humble  and  look  upon  this  poor  creature  and  say,  "^Nly 
brother.'  Oh,  father,  there  is  much  to  be  done.  There  are  long 
hours,  days,  months  of  patience,  labors  and  prayer  needed 
to  raise  such.  There  is  enough  to  do,  and  yet  how  powerless 
we  are." 

A  sentence  from  another  letter,  written  after  he  got  to  his 
task,  reveals  the  same  sensitiveness  of  soul  and  the  reality 
and  splendor  of  his  missionary'  faith:  ''The  same  beUef  I  have 
now  that  I  had  before  I  left  America,  only  with  this  difference: 
it  is  real  now,  it  has  entered  into  my  own  experience:  it  has 
become  a  part,  not  only  of  my  convictions  and  behef,  but  it 
has  grown  into  me,  become  mine;  it  is  no  longer  haz\'  and  far 
off,  it  has  touched  me:  I  have  felt  the  coolness  of  the  chill  of 
Death's  hand  —  'dead  in  trespasses  and  sin'  —  touch  me,  and. 
thank  God  I  even  now  I  can  say  with  all  the  same  feeUng  that 
often  swept  over  me  in  California,  Boston,  and  England,  Tn 
this  name  we  conquer '  —  Jesus  —  '  for  He  shall  save  his 
people  from  their  sins.'" 

Hardly  had  the  mission  recovered  from  the  loss  of  its  leader 
when,  in  a  whiff  of  suspicion,  and  as  it  proved,  instigated  and 
Expulsion  bribed  by  unfriendly  traders,  in  ^Nlay,  1SS4,  King 
of  the  Kwikwi  stirred  up  his  people  to  drive  out  the  mis- 

Mission-  sionaries.  So  sudden  and  threatening  was  this  out- 
^"^^  break  that  from  both  stations  they  were  compelled 

to  flee  to  the  coast,  lea^-ing  most  of  their  possessions  to  be  plun- 
dered by  the  natives  and  with  their  labor  apparently  altogether 
lost.  Several  of  the  missionaries  returned  to  America;  ^Mr. 
Walter  remained  at  Benguella  to  defend  as  might  be  possible 
the  interests  of  the  mission.  Happily,  after  a  short  time,  the 
chiefs,    con\TQced   of   their   mistake,    and    influenced    bv    the 


340  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

governor-general  of  Angola,  invited  the  missionaries  to  return. 
Mr.  and  Mrs.  Sanders,  who  had  only  gone  to  the  coast,  were 
back  at  Bailundu  the  same  year;  in  due  time  their  associates 
joined  them  and  the  mission  was  reestablished,  with  Mr. 
Walter  settled  for  a  while  at  Benguella  as  its  business  agent. 

Aside  from  this  outbreak  no  serious  opposition  was  experi- 
enced from  native  ruler  or  people.  The  king  of  Bihe  did  show 
The  ^  disposition  to  treat  Mr.  Sanders  harshly,  but,  while 

Mission  stirring  his  people  to  an  attack,  he  fell  dead  in  a 
Planted  drunken  carouse,  and  the  missionaries  were  relieved 
of  further  danger  from  that  quarter.  New  stations  were 
gradually  opened,  as  at  Chisamba,  by  Mr.  Currie  in  1888. 
This  station  has  from  the  beginning  been  maintained  by  mis- 
sionaries and  funds  from  the  Congregational  churches  of 
Canada,  operating  through  the  American  Board.  Schools  of 
various  grades,  under  the  instruction  of  missionaries,  were 
established  at  all  the  stations;  a  press  was  set  up  and  books 
and  papers  put  into  circulation;  new  houses  were  erected  both 
for  the  missionaries  and  for  those  natives  who  had  yielded 
themselves  to  the  influence  of  a  Christian  civilization.  Preach- 
ing also  was  begun,  religious  meetings  being  held,  before  there 
was  any  chapel,  in  the  homes  of  the  missionaries  on  Sundays 
and  week-days. 

At  Bailundu,  in  1887,  fourteen  young  men,  the  oldest  not 
more  than  twenty  years  of  age,  were  baptized  and  organized 
into  a  church,  with  deacons  from  their  own  number,  and  with 
their  most  promising  representative  soon  chosen  as  pastor. 
This  first  church  erected  at  its  own  expense  a  house  of  worship, 
and  began  evangelistic  work  in  the  surrounding  villages.  The 
significance  of  the  step  which  these  lads  took  appears  in  the 
fact  that  they  solemnly  renounced  the  use  of  alcoholic  drinks 
and  tobacco,  and  the  practises  of  slavery,  fornication,  and  of 
idolatry,  that  is,  fetishism  of  every  sort. 

The  further  story  of  this  established  mission  belongs  with  the 
record  of  the  other  African  fields  and  is  told  in  a  later  chapter. 


INTO  NEW  FIELDS  341 

East  Central  Africa 

At  the  annual  meeting  of  1879,  when  it  was  determined  to 
open  a  mission  near  Bihe  in  West  Africa,  it  was  decided  also 

to  start  one  on  the  other  side  of  the  continent.  The 
p  Board's  early  purpose  to  found  an  interior  mission 

in  East  Africa  had  not  been  forgotten.  It  was 
never  meant  that  it  should  confine  its  operations  to  the  small 
territory  occupied  in  Natal;  and  even  that  was  now  further 
limited  by  the  incoming  of  other  missionary  societies.  Also 
the  development  of  the  Christian  Zulus  required  a  larger  field, 
where  they  might  exert  their  influence  and  broaden  their 
horizon.  The  time  seemed  ripe  for  the  venture  and  all  signs 
pointed  to  Umzila's  kingdom  as  the  location.  Umzila  was 
then  the  great  chieftain  of  the  region  in  South  Africa  lying 
south  from  the  Zambesi  River  and  stretching  to  the  latitude 
of  Delagoa  Bay,  where  it  joined  the  territory  claimed  by  the 
British.  Portuguese  authority  was  hardly  recognized  here 
except  along  a  narrow  strip  of  coast.  The  whole  interior, 
commonly  called  the  Gaza  country,  was  under  the  control 
of  Umzila.  On  this  vast  and  fertile  tableland  there  was  a 
field  as  yet  untouched,  with  people  absolutely  heathen,  yet 
with  fine  native  capacities  and  belonging  to  the  same  Bantu 
race  as  those  of  Natal.  They  were  a  direct  challenge  to  the 
Board's  expanding  purpose;  it  might  yet  be  possible  to  plant 
through  Umzila's  country  a  line  of  mission  stations  to  touch, 
on  the  lower  Zambesi,  the  waterway  that  reached  almost  to 
Bihe  on  the  western  side  of  the  continent. 

Accordingly,  in  1880,  Mr.  Pinkerton  of  the  Zulu  Mission 
was  appointed  to  organize  an  exploring  expedition,   and,   if 

the  way  opened,  to  prepare  for  starting  the  new 
^^       ^     mission.     The  young  missionary  set  about  his  task 

enthusiastically,  only  to  be  stricken  down  in  the 
malarial  region,  through  which,  either  unwisely  or  by  adverse 
necessity,  he  had  laid  his  route,  and  where  his  lonely  grave 


342  STORY   OF  THE   AMERICAN   BOARD 

became  the  first  landmark  in  the  march  of  Christianity  into 
that  new  country.  Mr.  Richards,  sent  to  join  the  enterprise, 
bravely  took  the  place  of  the  fallen  leader  and  pushed  his 
way  safely  to  Umzila's  capital  on  the  high  lands,  where  he 
was  cordially  received,  and  urged  to  begin  missionary  work. 
A  ringing  appeal  was  sent  to  America  for  four  families  to 
answer  the  call  of  this  African  chief.  But  these  families  could 
not  be  found,  nor  were  the  Zulu  helpers  ready  to  offer  them- 
selves, and  Umzila's  invitation  was  unanswered.  The  door  thus 
allowed  to  close  was  never  again  so  easily  to  be  opened. 
When  the  Board  was  ready  to  make  new  trial,  in  1888,  and 
another  expedition,  consisting  of  Messrs.  Wilder  and  Bates, 
with  difficulty  approached  the  royal  kraal,  and,  after  weeks 
of  delay  and  spying,  at  last  got  audience  with  the  new  chief 
Gungunyana,  they  found  that  the  temper  had  changed.  Others 
had  preempted  the  ground;  a  foreign  prospector  was  searching 
the  land  for  gold;  the  Portuguese  were  actively  negotiating. 
The  king  gave  courteous  attention  to  the  missionaries,  but 
finally  replied:  "Your  feet  have  been  too  slow  in  coming. 
We  have  other  missionaries  now;  we  cannot  take  you  also." 
With  this  reproach  weighing  on  their  hearts,  the  messengers 
of  the  Board  were  forced  to  turn  back. 

A  temporary  location  had  been  made  at  Inhambane  Bay  by 
Messrs.  Wilcox  and  Richards,  in  1883,  until  the  way  should 
Temporary  open  to  the  interior.  Rev.  and  Mrs.  Benjamin  F. 
Location  at  Ousley  and  Miss  Nancy  Jones,  negro  helpers  from 
Inhambane  America,  came  to  their  aid,  and  the  East  Central 
Africa  Mission  was  really  organized  there.  Several  locations 
around  the  Bay  were  occupied,  and  Mr.  Ousley  reduced  the 
Sheetswa  language  to  writing  so  far  as  to  translate  into  it 
some  of  the  New  Testament.  The  region,  however,  proved 
too  unhealthy  to  allow  the  mission  to  lose  sight  of  the  original 
plan  of  settling  on  higher  land  away  from  the  coast. 

With  the  passing  of  Gazaland  into  the  control  of  the  British 
South  Africa  Company,  the  Board  renewed  explorations  into 


INTO  NEW  FIELDS  343 

the  region  which  then  came  to  be  called  Rhodesia,  and  in  1893 
the  new  mission  was  formally  organized.     It  was  planned  to 

employ  native  Zulu  evangelists;  to  make  industrial 
L  ^r*      work  a  strong  factor  in  the  development    of   the 

mission;  and  to  fix  the  central  location  at  Mt. 
Silinda,  from  which  highland  station  systematic  work  could 
be  attempted,  particularly  by  native  helpers,  and  during  the 
winter  months,  at  least,  on  the  lower  part  of  the  Busi  and 
Sabi  rivers  that  drain  the  country.  The  exploring  party 
of  1891  had  the  good  fortune  to  meet  Hon.  Cecil  Rhodes,  from 
whom  they  received  many  courtesies.  When  their  purpose 
was  explained  to  him  he  expressed  his  approval  of  it,  promised 
them  a  concession  of  several  thousand  acres  of  land  at  nominal 
rent,  and  taking  a  map  marked  out  what  he  considered  the 
most  favorable  location  for  the  mission,  which  later  proved  to 
be  the  very  spot  selected  for  the  Mt.  Silinda  station.  To 
this  region  in  the  highlands,  4000  feet  above  sea-level,  on  the 
upper  waters  of  the  Busi  River,  about  200  miles  inland  from 
the  coast,  with  fertile  land  all  about,  and  the  one  fine  forest 
of  the  region  adjoining,  the  founders  of  the  mission,  Messrs. 
Wilder,  Bates,  Bunker,  and  Thompson,  the  last  a  medical 
missionary,  their  wives,  and  Miss  Nancy  Jones,  the  first  unmar- 
ried woman  of  the  negro  race  ever  commissioned  by  the  Ameri- 
can Board,  set  forth  from  Durban  June  21,  1893. 

It  took  them  three  months  to  get  to  their  field.  From 
Beira  they  sailed  up  the  Busi  to  Jobo's  kraal,  where  they 

shifted  to  smaller  boats,  and  eighty  miles  further 

r  .     were  forced  to  take  to  foot  travel  for  the  last  150 

Journey  in 

miles  of  their  journey.     At  each  stage  their  goods 

were  reduced  to  smaller  packages,  each  family  at  last  dividing 
its  possessions  into  three  classes,  "must  have,"  "would  like," 
and  "can't  take." 

Camping  along  this  unfamiliar  trail,  with  the  untrained  car- 
riers, was  not  a  simple  or  comfortable  experience.  The  trials 
of    the  time  were  more  easily  laughed  over   afterward  than 


344  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

while  they  were  endured.  But  the  slow  rate  of  progress  gave 
chance  for  making  acquaintance  at  the  kraals  of  minor  chiefs 
along  the  route  and  for  winning  confidence  by  such  kindnesses 
as  could  be  shown.  Some  surgical  operations  were  performed, 
and  many  simple  ministries  to  the  sick.  It  was  a  good  oppor- 
tunity, too,  to  study  the  people  at  close  range,  to  test  the 
availability  of  the  Zulu  language,  and  to  learn  the  new  dialects. 
The  wildness  of  the  country,  the  beauty  of  the  scenery,  and 
the  noises  of  the  beasts  and  birds  of  the  forests,  gave  interest 
and  excitement  to  every  mile  of  the  journey.  Plenty  of  ven- 
ison and  fish  could  be  secured  for  the  table.  At  last  Mt. 
Sihnda  was  reached  on  October  19. 

Beginnings  were  like   those   in  other  primitive  or  savage 

lands.     Houses  had  to  be  built,  land  cleared,  crops  planted, 

roads  marked,  and  all  the  main  lines  of  missionary 

egmnings    ^^^^    started    from    the    bottom.     The   difficulties 
of  Work 

were  manifold.     It  was  not  easy  to  establish  friendly 

relations  with  officials  and  colonists.  The  preceding  year 
there  was  scarcely  a  white  settler  in  the  region  of  Silinda, 
but  before  the  mission  opened  English  and  Dutch  farmers 
had  come  in  and  made  a  settlement  some  thirty  miles  north 
of  the  prospective  station.  Complications  as  to  possession 
of  the  mission  site,  arising  from  the  disputed  authority  of 
the  Rhodesian  or  Portuguese  governments  in  the  region, 
involved  much  trouble  and  even  expense. 

It  was  hard  work,  also,  to  gain  the  confidence  and  good-will 
of  the  natives;  they  had  not  had  the  best  of  experience  with 
white  men.  Moreover,  they  were  not  accustomed  to  industry 
or  self-control,  but  had  the  savage's  habits  of  idleness,  drunken- 
ness, vice,  and  crime.  Grossest  forms  of  polygamy,  including 
the  buying  and  selling  of  women,  were  common.  The  intense 
superstition  of  the  people,  in  bondage  to  witch-doctors  and  all 
the  tyranny  of  witchcraft,  made  it  hard  to  win  any  genuine 
interest  in  Christian  ideals  and  ways.  A  scourge  of  rinderpest 
soon  necessitated  the  killing  of  all  the  cattle  and  made  still 


INTO  NEW  FIELDS  345 

heavier  the  burden  of  the  mission.  For  goods  brought  to 
within  even  100  miles  six  months  before  could  not  be  secured 
until  some  new  means  of  transportation  should  be  obtained. 

In  spite  of  these  difficulties  and  the  primal  struggle  to 
maintain  life  and  health,  mission  work  in  all  its  usual  forms 
was  promptly  begun.  On  December  2,  1893,  less  than  two 
months  after  the  arrival  of  the  party,  the  mission  voted  that 
a  day  school  should  be  opened  on  December  11.  It  was  not 
easy  to  start  this  school;  parents  were  suspicious,  and  when 
the  consent  of  the  chief  and  the  parents  was  obtained  it  appeared 
that  the  children  did  not  care  to  attend.  But  a  few  were 
drawn  into  the  school,  and  when  the  time  for  the  exhibition 
came  it  happened  in  Africa,  as  in  the  rest  of  the  world,  that 
parents  were  proud  to  see  what  their  children  could  do,  and 
the  future  of  the  school  was  assured.  The  second  station  was 
opened  in  1895,  at  Chikore,  twenty  miles  west  of  Silinda,  Mr. 
Wilder  being  assigned  to  open  work  on  this  new  frontier. 

Little  by  little  the  situation  grew  easier;  the  confidence  of 
government  officials  was  won;  many  of  the  colonists  became 
friendly;  some  permanent  buildings  and  equipment  were 
secured;  the  work  of  the  pioneers  became  more  the  regular 
tasks  of  missionaries.  The  further  record,  therefore,  belongs 
to  a  later  chapter  describing  the  progress  of  the  period  in  all 
the  African  missions. 

Shansi 

The  roots  of  the  Shansi  Mission  run  back  to  Oberlin,  where, 
in  the  year  1879-80,  a  dozen  students  in  the  theological  sem- 
inary proposed  to  Prof.  Judson  Smith,  their  honored  teacher  in 
church  history,  that  they  should  go  under  his  leadership  to 
establish  a  mission  in  China.  It  did  not  come  out  quite  as  they 
had  planned.  But  from  this  interview  grew  the  ''Oberlin 
Band,"  and  when  the  American  Board  determined  the  follow- 
ing year  (1881)  to  organize  the  Shansi  Mission,  one  of  that 
band,  Rev.  Martin  L.  Stimson,  and  his  wife  were  the  pioneers 


346  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

to  go  to  the  field.  Other  members  followed  until,  in  1900,  the 
force  numbered  sixteen;  and,  as  Dr.  Smith  in  1884  succeeded 
Dr.  Means  as  foreign  secretary,  and  the  China  missions  then 
came  under  his  care,  he  did  become  virtually  the  leader  of 
his  former  pupils. 

The  province  of  Shansi,  lying  to  the  west  of  the  imperial 
province  of  Chi-li  and  separated  from  it  by  mountain  ranges, 
is  one  of  the  interior  districts  of  China,  a  highland  country, 
3000  feet  above  sea-level,  in  large  part  mountainous,  but  with 
broad  and  fertile  valleys  between  the  ranges.  Its  area  is 
about  that  of  Minnesota,  82,000  square  miles;  like  Minnesota, 
too,  it  is  a  rich  wheat  country,  while  in  the  mountains  are 
great  beds  of  unmined  ore,  the  coal  alone  representing  fabulous 
wealth.  It  has  a  population  of  12,000,000,  but  even  so,  is 
not  so  densely  settled  as  other  provinces  of  China.  The  people 
are  unusually  well-to-do,  according  to  Chinese  standards, 
having  a  higher  grade  of  homes  and  a  more  adequate  living 
than  many  of  their  countrymen.  A  thrifty  commercial  people, 
they  are  noted  for  their  intelligence  and  enterprise;  a  large 
proportion  of  the  bankers  of  China  come  from  this  province 
of  Shansi. 

The  first  station  was  opened  at  Tai-yuan-fu,  the  capital  of 
the  province,  but  in  the  interests  of  mission  comity  the  work 
was  soon  transferred  to  Tai-ku  and  a  second  station 
th  ^W^Tk  ^^Sun  at  Fen-cho-fu.  Both  these  cities  lie  to  the 
south  of  the  capital  in  a  large  and  thickly  settled 
district  where  no  other  society  is  working.  The  missionaries 
were  at  once  struck  with  the  superior  character  of  the  villages 
compared  with  those  they  had  seen  in  the  rest  of  China.  It 
was  noticeable,  also,  that  many  of  the  temples  were  neglected 
and  decaying;  idols  were  covered  with  dust,  broken,  or  lying 
on  the  ground.  In  the  cities  they  were  better  maintained  than 
in  the  country;  visiting  several  temples,  the  missionaries  found 
not  a  single  worshiper. 

But  this  loss  of  faith  in  the  old  way  did  not  betoken  a  zeal 


INTO   NEW   FIELDS  347 

for  the  new.  These  thrifty  people  were  money  worshipers 
and  customarily  indifferent  to  other  appeals.  Furthermore, 
the  province  was  fearfully  addicted  to  opium;  seventy-five 
per  cent  of  the  people  were  judged  to  be  users  of  the  drug. 
The  missionaries  were  compelled  to  open  refuges  where  they 
could  exercise,  not  only  physical  care  and  relief,  but  the  benefit  of 
Christian  support  in  the  effort  to  break  off  the  habit.  Although 
there  were  not  a  few  lapses,  yet  many  conspicuous  cures  were 
effected  such  as  the  native  quacks  could  not  show.  Soon  it 
was  necessary  to  charge  an  admission  fee  to  provide  for  the 
expense  of  this  enlarging  work,  with  the  result  that  a  better 
class  of  patients  was  secured  and  insincere  applicants  were 
driven  away.  The  ministry  of  these  opium  refuges  thus 
formed  one  of  the  most  effective  ways  of  preaching  the  gospel 
in  Shansi. 

The  touring  of  the  region  was  also  an  important  part  of  the 
early  evangelistic  effort,  opportunity  being  found  in  connection 
with  the  characteristic  village  and  town  fairs  to  gain  a  hearing 
for  the  new  gospel.  And  here,  as  elsewhere  in  China,  the  street 
chapel  was  successful  for  opening  acquaintance.  It  was  slow 
work,  however,  in  this  interior  province  to  get  any  serious 
attention  to  the  truth.  A  crowd  was  easily  gathered  in  places 
where  often  no  Westerner  had  been  seen  until  the  missionary 
came,  but  the  cry,  ''Here  comes  the  foreign  devil,"  was  fre- 
quently raised,  and  sometimes  with  evident  ill-feeling.  How- 
ever, by  patience,  straightforwardness,  and  kindness,  prejudices 
were  gradually  overcome.  When  a  little  boy  in  Tai-ku  fell 
from  his  house,  Mr.  Price  took  over  some  simple  remedies  and 
dressed  the  wounds  each  day  until  they  healed.  The  wealthy 
neighbor,  "lord  of  wealth,"  as  he  was  called,  who  had  scarcely 
spoken  to  the  missionaries  before,  was  now  quite  willing  that 
some  of  his  household  should  visit  them  daily.  As  the  house- 
hold consisted  of  not  less  than  twenty  people,  a  considerable 
increase  of  friends  was  made  by  this  one  event. 

In  those  days  it  was  worth  much  to  the  waiting  missionaries 


348  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

to  find  here  and  there  a  hfe  clearly  transformed  by  the  gospel. 
One  such  convert,  in  1889,  became  a  true  helper  at  Fen-cho-fu. 

A  Christian  tract  had  drifted  into  his  hand  during 
-^.    .^^^      boyhood  days  and  had  awakened  a  desire  to  learn 

more  about  Jesus.  Though  his  parents  approved, 
they  could  give  him  no  help.  Years  afterward  the  young 
man  heard  the  gospel  preached  at  the  American  Mission  chapel 
at  Peking,  and  later  applied  for  baptism.  On  his  return  to 
Shansi,  Mr.  Stimson  gave  him  a  course  of  training  and  found 
in  him  a  true  helper  and  an  eloquent  preacher.  And  he  bore 
the  test  of  a  changed  life;  whereas  before  he  had  the  charac- 
teristic greed  of  his  people,  he  became  notably  generous,  his 
charities  going  out  on  every  side  and  involving  real  self-denial. 
With  the  opening  of  chapels  and  the  starting  of  schools,  this 
mission  also  passed  from  the  era  of  beginnings  into  that  of 
normal  growth;  its  record  thereafter  belongs  to  the  general 
story  of  the  China  missions  in  this  period. 

South  China 

As  the  Shansi  Mission  can  be  traced  back  to  the  influence  of 
Oberlin  Seminary,  so  the  South  China  Mission  had  for  its 
Where  progenitor    the   American   Missionary   Association. 

Home  and  The  work  of  this  society  among  the  Chinese  on  the 
Foreign  Pacific  coast  had  been  so  successful  that  in  the  70s 
^®*  there  was  a  company  of  devoted  Chinese  Christians 

from  Kwangtung  province  urging  it  to  establish  a  mission  in 
their  homeland  that  would  help  those  returning  both  to  keep 
true  to  their  new  faith  and  to  conduct  missionary  work  among 
their  countrjnnen.  The  proposal  to  undertake  work  in  this 
province  the  Association  passed  on  to  the  American  Board. 
So  when  it  became  possible,  with  the  Otis  and  Swett  legacies, 
to  enter  new  fields,  the  Board  voted  in  1882  to  reenter  Kwang- 
tung with  what  was  at  first  called  the  Hong  Kong  Mission, 
but  was  afterward  named  the  South  China  Mission. 

The  new  enterprise  in  this  province,  the  earliest  field  of  the 


INTO  NEW  FIELDS  349 

Board's  work  in  China,  was  at  first  somewhat  tentative,  the 
object  being  definitely  to  safeguard  and  utiHze  the  results  of 
mission  work  in  Cahfornia.  The  first  missionary.  Dr.  C.  R. 
Hager,  who  had  labored  among  the  Chinese  in  and  around 
San  Francisco,  was  located  at  Hong  Kong,  where  for  eight 
years  he  was  the  only  missionary  on  the  field.  The  endeavor  was 
to  keep  in  close  touch  with  the  returning  Chinese  and  through 
them  to  reach  out  into  the  country  districts  adjoining.  At  once 
an  evening  school  was  opened  where  English  was  taught  after 
the  manner  of  the  schools  for  the  Chinese  in  San  Francisco. 

The  method  of  advance  in  this  mission  was  simple.  Some 
acquaintance  being  made  in  the  villages  and  cities  round  about, 
The  upon  a  visit  from  the  missionary,  meetings  were 

Mission's  held;  next,  a  site  for  regular  services  was  secured; 
Method  Qii  available  teacher  or  preacher  was  put  in  charge, 
and  thus  a  new  outstation  was  formed.  The  system  involved 
much  touring  and  patient  seed  sowing;  the  missionary  was 
especially  dependent  upon  the  support  of  the  people  on  the 
field,  as  the  Board  hesitated  to  enter  strongly  into  a  region 
which  it  had  given  over  to  others. 

With  such  slight  equipment,  advance  was  made;  in  some 
respects  the  gains  were  notably  rapid  and  strong.  At  length 
in  Hong  Kong  a  large  building  was  secured  for  mission  pur- 
poses, providing  for  the  missionary's  home,  the  church,  schools, 
and  business  office  of  the  mission,  all  at  a  cost  of  several  thou- 
sand dollars,  the  funds  being  raised  almost  entirely  on  the 
ground.  In  1893,  with  the  arrival  of  Rev.  and  Mrs.  C.  A. 
Nelson,  the  city  of  Canton  was  also  occupied  and  the  business 
center  of  the  mission  was  transferred  to  that  city.  These 
two  stations  are  all  that  have  been  occupied.  Nevertheless, 
the  mission,  slightly  fed  by  funds  from  the  homeland,  except 
by  contributions  from  Chinese  in  America,  became  firmly 
established  and  efficient,  so  that  it  too  passed  out  of  the  experi- 
mental stage  to  find  its  place  among  the  substantial  missions 
of  the  Board  in  the  Celestial  Empire. 


350  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

Northern  Japan 

In  1883  the  Board  took  over  from  an  English  society  its 
mission  work  in  the  important  city  of  Niigata,  the  only  open 
An  port  on  the  west  coast  of  Japan.     This  enterprise 

Artificial  was  given  the  name  of  the  Northern  Japan  Mis- 
Division  sion,  mainly  that  its  support  might  be  drawn  from 
that  part  of  the  Otis  fund  which  had  been  set  aside  to  found 
new  missions.  The  region  was  indeed  remote  from  the  other 
locations  of  the  Board  in  the  empire  at  that  time,  as  was  also 
that  of  Sendai  in  northeastern  Japan,  which  became  the  second 
station  in  this  mission.  Yet  the  character  of  the  work  to  be 
done  here  was  practically  the  same  as  that  in  the  rest  of 
Japan,  and,  as  there  was  no  abiding  reason  for  maintaining 
the  two  names,  in  1891  the  artificial  division  was  abandoned 
and  Japan  became  again  a  single  mission  field  of  the  Board. 
From  the  first,  the  story  of  missionary  effort  in  Niigata  and 
its  region  is  so  like  what  was  going  on  elsewhere  in  the  land 
that  the  report  of  its  progress  may  be  included  with  the  rest. 

Northern  Mexico 

When  occasion  arose  for  expanding  the  Board^s  work  in 
Mexico,  in  1882,  a  new  mission  was  organized  for  the  same 
Another  reason  as  in  northern  Japan,  and  the  enterprise  in 
Temporary  the  state  of  Chihuahua  was  called  the  Northern 
Distinction  Mexico  Mission.  The  first  station  of  the  mission 
was  in  the  city  of  Chihuahua,  situated  on  the  Mexican  Central 
Railway,  225  miles  south  of  El  Paso  on  the  Rio  Grande,  a 
three  days'  journey  by  rail  from  St.  Louis.  Recognizing  the 
new  era  that  was  opening  before  the  young  republic,  the 
American  Board  seized  upon  this  important  center,  nearest  to 
and  in  close  touch  with  the  United  States. 

Upon  opening  work  there,  Rev.  and  Mrs.  James  D.  Eaton, 
who  were  the  founders  of  this  mission,  discovered  a  situation 
full  of  promise.     The  Roman  Catholic  Church,  which  had  been 


INTO   NEW  FIELDS  351 

the  exclusive  religious  organization  in  this  city  for  generations, 
had  characteristically  kept  the  people  in  ignorance  and  had 
been  satisfied  to  secure  their  outward  allegiance.  The  old 
Church  had  now  been  deprived  of  her  immense  estates,  neither 
priests  nor  sisters  of  charity  being  allowed  to  wear  the  dress 
of  their  orders  on  the  street,  and  the  traditional  and  grossly 
superstitious  rites,  involving  ghastly  exhibitions,  being  confined 
to  the  church  buildings. 

A  system  of  public  schools  had  been  introduced,  with  2000 
pupils  already  under  instruction;  a  public  library  had  been 
founded;  and  enterprising  business  men  were  eager  to  learn 
the  English  language.  The  mayor  of  the  city,  a  man  of  dis- 
tinguished ability  and  intelligence,  was  ruling  with  firmness, 
but  with  kindness.  The  time  was  opportune  for  the  introduc- 
tion of  evangelical  Christianity.  Though  the  mass  of  people 
were  still  desperately  superstitious  and  prejudiced,  a  good 
number  were  ready  to  listen,  while  some  of  the  more  enlight- 
ened adherents  of  the  Roman  Catholic  Church  welcomed  the 
mission  as  likely  to  stimulate  and  elevate  their  own  communion. 
Some  converts  were  quickly  won.  Within  four  years  (in  1886) 
enough  had  been  baptized  to  organize  a  church,  which  soon 
attained  good  size  and  prosperity  with  a  pastor  of  its  own. 
Outstations  were  opened;  educational  work  was  undertaken; 
the  life  of  a  full-fledged  mission  was  soon  under  way. 

But  in  Mexico,  as  in  Japan,  the  work  of  the  two  sections  was 
practically  the  same.  There  was  no  sound  reason  for  main- 
taining permanently  the  two  organizations,  so  that  in  1891, 
after  a  decade  of  work,  when  the  period  of  beginnings  was 
over,  the  Western  and  Northern  Mexican  Missions  were  com- 
bined. The  story  of  the  progress  in  the  north  will  be  told  with 
that  of  Western  Mexico  in  a  later  chapter. 


Chapter  XX 

THE  FARTHER   EAST 

Japan 

The  opening  years  of  this  period  were  marked  by  phenom- 
enal advance  in  all  missionary  work  in  Japan.  The  second 
Years  of  conference  of  Protestant  missionaries,  held  in  Osaka, 
Swift  in  1883,  was  a  meeting  of  deep  spiritual  power.     At 

Increase  to  the  convention  of  Japanese  churches  in  Tokyo,  the 
1888  following  month,  the  kindling  religious  enthusiasm 

was  fanned  into  flame.  Indeed,  revival  conditions  were 
already  manifest  in  some  large  cities.  Upon  the  graduation 
of  the  first  class  from  the  Kyoto  Training  School,  as  the 
Doshisha  was  then  called,  its  fifteen  young  men  had  been  sent 
out  to  attempt  evangelistic  work  among  their  countrymen. 
Thus  the  way  was  prepared  for  a  yet  more  vigorous  attack 
whenever  the  churches  should  be  ready  for  advance;  that  time 
had  now  come. 

The  delegates  went  back  from  the  convention  fired  with  a 
new  ambition  to  lead  their  churches  to  larger  service.  In 
cities  like  Osaka,  Niigata,  and  Kyoto,  there  soon  appeared 
revival  scenes;  everywhere  the  churches  became  filled  with 
attentive  congregations;  as  the  months  went  on  the  movement 
toward  Christianity  grew  in  extent  and  power.  A  crisis  seemed 
to  have  come  in  the  religious  history  of  Japan. 

An  important  factor  in  this  evangelistic  work  was  the  ser- 
vices or  mass  meetings  held  in  the  bare  and  barn-like  but 
commodious  theaters.  In  them  thousands  could 
«  ^^  ®'  gather,  little  families  or  companies  occupying  sep- 
arate stalls  on  the  floor,  often  bringing  their  lunches 
and  making  a  day  of  it.  All  classes  of  society  were  represented, 
from  the  coolie  to  the  priest  and  the  samurai;  ladies  had  a 

352 


THE  FARTHER  EAST  353 

gallery  to  themselves;  public  officials  were  assigned  a  box 
near  the  stage.  Missionaries  and  Christian  Japanese  were 
the  speakers,  one  following  another  as  the  hours  passed;  short 
intermissions  were  allowed  for  the  shifting  of  the  audience, 
an  exchange  of  thoughts,  and  perhaps  a  smoke.  The  speakers 
were  freely  applauded,  as  well  as  the  singers  from  the  training- 
school  who  were  grouped  about  the  cabinet  organ.  The  influ- 
ence of  these  meetings  was  immense. 

Thus  the  fire  spread  until  the  word  '' revival"  was  every- 
where coming  to  be  familiar  to  Japanese  Christians.  In  the 
An  schools,    also,   earnest   inquirers  were  appearing   in 

Awakened  such  numbers  as  almost  to  absorb  attention.  The 
Empire  Doshisha  enjoyed  a  memorable  awakening,  in  which 
the  students  gathered  by  classes  for  prayer  and  confession, 
from  which  they  went  out  to  preach  Christ  to  others. 

The  growth  in  the  churches  was  remarkable.  Between 
April,  1883,  and  1884,  the  Kumi-ai  churches  increased  sixty- 
eight  per  cent,  and  during  the  following  year  fifty-three  per 
cent.  By  1889  the  Home  Missionary  Society  was  conduct- 
ing regular  work  at  forty-six  different  points  in  seventeen 
provinces  of  the  empire.  Besides  what  was  done  in  public 
ways  the  quiet  influence  of  Christian  lives  and  homes  and 
the  spread  of  the  gospel  by  the  printed  Word  were  constantly 
extending  the  knowledge  of  Christianity.  When  the  govern- 
ment in  1884  ended  the  official  patronage  of  the  Shinto  and 
Buddhist  religions,  thus  separating  Church  and  State,  a  great 
gain  was  made  for  the  missionary  cause. 

The  missionaries,  however,  were  not  yet  allowed  to  work 
without  opposition  or  persecution.  The  enmity  of  the  priest- 
Still  Oppo-  hood  increased  as  they  saw  their  own  power 
sition  and  and  privileges  waning.  Sometimes  violence  was 
Interfer-  attempted;  threats  were  more  numerous.  A  letter 
®^^®  to  the  Kyoto  missionaries  shows  the  temper  of  the 

attack : 

''To  the  four  American  Barbarians;  Davis,  Gordon,  Learned, 


354  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

and  Greene;  We  speak  to  you  who  have  come  with  words 
that  are  sweet  in  the  mouth  but  a  sword  in  the  heart,  bad 
priests,  American  Barbarians,  four  robbers.  You  have  come 
from  a  far  country  with  the  evil  reUgion  of  Christ  and  as  slaves 
of  the  Japanese  robber  Neesima.  With  bad  teaching  you  are 
gradually  deceiving  the  people;  but  we  know  your  hearts,  and 
hence  we  shall  soon  with  Japanese  swords  inflict  the  punish- 
ment of  heaven  upon  you.  Japan  being  truly  a  flourishing, 
excellent  country,  in  ancient  times  when  Buddhism  first  came 
to  Japan,  those  who  brought  it  were  killed;  in  the  same  way 
you  must  be  killed.  But  we  do  not  want  to  defile  the  sacred 
soil  of  Japan  with  your  abominable  blood;  for  this  reason  we 
wait  two  weeks  and  you  must  leave  Kyoto  and  go  to  your 
country;  if  not,  the  little  robbers  of  the  Doshisha  School,  and 
all  the  believers  of  this  way  in  the  city,  will  be  killed;  hence, 
take  your  families  and  go  quickly. 

Patriots  in  the  Peaceful  City;  Believers  in  Shinto." 
Buddhist  priests  attempted  to  follow  the  methods  of  the 
Christians  by  holding  mass  meetings  and  prompting  speakers 
to  challenge  the  claims  of  Christianity  and  to  extol  those  of 
Buddhism.  Some  educated  men,  like  Mr.  Fukuzawa,  set 
themselves  by  book  and  lecture  to  drive  Christianity  out  of 
Japan.  But  in  spite  of  all  opposition,  direct  or  adroit,  Chris- 
tianity spread.  The  demands  on  the  missionaries  were  almost 
overwhelming.  Whereas  in  1880  the  Board  had  but  four 
stations  in  the  empire,  by  1890  it  had  nine,  some  of  them 
opened  with  special  promise.  From  the  central  group  of 
stations  at  the  head  of  the  inland  sea,  the  work  broadened 
over  the  empire.  The  beginning  at  Sendai,  the  second  station 
in  northern  Japan,  indicates  the  encouragement  that  Chris- 
tianity was  receiving.  A  wealthy  citizen,  for  a  number  of 
years  Japanese  consul  in  New  York,  backed  by  the  cordial 
appeal  of  the  people  of  the  place,  offered  to  open  a  school 
that  might  grow  into  a  college  if  the  Board  would  only  furnish 
the  head  teachers  for  ten  years.     The  city  officials  and  repre- 


THE  FARTHER  EAST  355 

sentative  citizens  were  present  at  the  opening  of  the  school, 
and  uttered  no  word  of  dissent  when  its  Christian  character 
was  affirmed. 

While  direct  evangelism  was  being  pressed  through  the 
activity  both  of  missionaries  and  native  Christians,  associated 
Allied  lines  of  work  were  fast  developing.     Other  branches 

Lines  of  of  missionary  activity,  such  as  the  educational  and 
Work  the  medical,  had  become  established  departments. 

Publication  was  now  organized  as  a  field  of  native  effort; 
the  formation,  in  1882,  of  the  Fukuin-sha,  or  Japanese  Pub- 
lishing Society,  gave  to  the  mission  an  important  ally. 

A  ministry  to  prisoners  became  prominent.  In  several  of 
the  prisons  Christians  were  appointed  as  teachers  of  morality, 
virtually  chaplains,  and  for  some  time  much  freedom  was 
allowed  them  in  teaching  Christianity.  As  many  of  the 
inmates  were  political  prisoners,  drawn  from  the  higher  ranks 
of  society,  and  afterward  to  become  influential  men  in  the 
changed  times,  the  importance  of  this  opportunity  to  reach 
them  is  evident.  At  Matsuyama  the  new  warden  was  an 
influential  Christian.  In  the  Hokkaido,  where  prisoners  from 
all  parts  of  Japan  were  massed,  there  were  at  one  time  Chris- 
tian men  as  chaplains  in  all  five  of  the  long-term  prisons. 

A  great  variety  of  philanthropic  and  social  activities,  inspired 
by  Christian  feeling,  were  undertaken,  some  of  them  upon 
private  initiative.  In  1887  Miss  Howe  opened  the  Glory 
Kindergarten  for  training  kindergartners  in  Kobe,  whose 
graduates  were  at  once  in  great  demand,  not  only  in  Christian 
kindergartens,  but  in  those  maintained  by  the  government. 
Wives  of  missionaries  and  unmarried  ladies  of  the  mission 
also  started  kindergartens  in  other  cities,  which  became  centers 
of  peculiar  and  formative  influence. 

The  nurses'  training-schools,  such  as  the  one  begun  by  Dr. 
Berry  in  1887,  night  schools  like  Miss  Judson's  in  Matsuyama, 
Mr.  Omoto's  Factory  Girls'  Home  in  the  same  city,  and  Miss 
Adams'  settlement  work  at  Hanabatake,  a  slum  quarter  of 


356  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

Okayama,  were  characteristic  forms  of  special  work,  originat- 
ing in  these  years,  and  of  each  of  which  there  is  enough  to 
be  told  to  fill  more  than  one  chapter. 

The  most  famous  of  these  expansions  of  missionary  work  is 
the  Okayama  Orphanage,  founded  by  Mr.  Ishii  Juji.  Though 
independently  started  and  maintained,  this  orphanage  has 
been  closely  associated  with  the  work  of  the  American  Board, 
Mr.  Ishii  being  a  member  of  a  Kumi-ai  church.  Beginning 
in  an  old  Buddhist  temple,  with  three  boys  in  his  care,  Mr. 
Ishii  maintained  his  asylum  on  the  same  principle  of  faith 
as  did  his  example,  George  Muller,  and  with  remarkable  suc- 
cess. Dr.  Pettee,  who  from  the  first  was  his  adviser  and 
loyal  helper,  has  been  the  means  of  interesting  friends  in  other 
countries  in  this  great  orphanage,  now  grown  to  care  for  550 
children.  In  1904  the  emperor  and  empress  contributed  a 
grant  of  $1000  to  the  orphanage,  the  first  Christian  institution 
to  be  thus  assisted. 

Another  special  line  of  applied  Christianity  in  these  vital 
times  was  the  movement  to  abolish  licensed  prostitution. 
The  crusade,  first  of  agitation  and  then  of  legal  effort,  involv- 
ing a  public  uprising  against  conditions  too  terrible  to  relate, 
was  inspired  by  Christians,  though  many  others  joined  in  it. 

So  by  the  year  1888  the  work  of  the  American  Board  Mission, 
as  of  all  the  missions  in  Japan,  was  in  full  flower.  There 
seemed  no  limit  to  the  influence  the  missionaries 
„  ,  ,  could  exert;  every  form  of  effort  appeared  throb- 
bing with  life  and  progress. 

The  prospects  of  the  Doshisha,  so  closely  allied  with  the 
mission  and  crowning  its  educational  enterprise  in  Japan, 
were  very  bright.  In  all  departments  there  were  now  900 
students,  eighty  in  the  theological  department  alone;  no  more 
could  be  cared  for.  Even  in  so  conservative  a  city  as  Kyoto 
the  school  had  by  this  time  won  its  place;  the  time  seemed 
ripe  for  advance.  Mr.  Neesima,  who  had  been  laying  his 
plans   and    presenting   his   appeals   unfalteringly   during   the 


THE  FARTHER  EAST  357 

years  of  persecution,  in  1888  issued  another  appeal,  published 
simultaneously  in  twenty  leading  newspapers  of  Japan,  for 
funds  to  make  his  school  the  Christian  university  that  had 
long  been  his  dream.  Large  gifts  followed  from  influential 
Japanese,  counts  and  viscounts;  from  a  prefectural  assembly; 
from  Hon.  J.  N.  Harris  of  New  London,  Connecticut,  already 
a  generous  supporter  of  the  school,  and  who  now  gave  $100,000 
for  the  establishment  of  a  scientific  department.  A  new  con- 
stitution provided  that  the  financial  management  of  the  insti- 
tution should  be  entirely  in  the  hands  of  the  Japanese  board 
of  trustees. 

The  leaven  of  Christianity  was  reaching  men  of  influence 
in  the  empire.  Dr.  Greene  reported  that  thirty  students  of 
the  university  were  avowed  Christians;  in  the  membership 
of  a  single  Kumi-ai  church  were  a  judge  of  the  Supreme  Court, 
a  professor  in  the  Lnperial  University,  three  government  secre- 
taries, and  members  of  at  least  two  noble  families.  Christians 
were  in  some  cases  high  officers  of  prefectural  legislatures. 
Five  out  of  the  forty  members  in  the  provincial  assembly  of 
Joshu,  in  1885,  were  Protestant  Christians,  and  three  of  them 
were  on  the  standing  committee  of  five;  important  measures 
of  social  reform  had  been  carried  through  the  assembly  by 
the  efforts  of  these  Christian  public  men. 

An  alarming  and  temporarily  disastrous  revulsion  of  feeling 
toward  Christianity  suddenly  became  widespread  through  the 
TheReac-  empire.  For  some  time  there  had  been  apprehen- 
tioninthe  sions  among  the  missionaries  that  the  growth  was 
Next  more  swift  than  sure.     While  much  of  the  quick 

Decade  acceptance  of  Christianity  was  genuine,  much  of  it 
also  was  fictitious.  It  was  a  part  of  Japan's  wholesale  adop- 
tion of  foreign  things.  Her  people  put  on  the  Western  religion 
as  they  did  European  clothes.  An  impelling  purpose  of  the 
"boom"  years  is  disclosed  in  Mr.  Fukuzawa's  advice.  Though 
disbelieving  Christianity,  and  at  one  time  attacking  it,  at 
length  he  urged  that  Japan  should  profess  the  new  faith,  what- 


358  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

ever  might  be  her  real  opinion  of  it,  in  order  to  gain  standing 
among  Christian  nations.     That  argument  counted. 

A  movement  to  a  considerable  extent  so  superficial  could 
not  fail  to  meet  with  reaction.  The  year  1889  witnessed  its 
outbreak.  This  was  the  epochal  year  when  the  Japanese  had 
their  initiation  into  self-government  in  the  elections  for  the 
first  national  parliament.  The  new  constitution  affirmed  full 
religious  liberty,  but  the  growing  sense  of  national  importance 
revolted  at  the  rapid  adoption  of  Western  ideas.  Anti-foreign 
feeling  became  very  strong.  Important  treaties  that  were 
just  on  the  point  of  adoption  were  indefinitely  postponed.  A 
noisy  revival  of  Buddhism  and  Shintoism  filled  the  air.  ''Japan 
for  the  Japanese's  was  the  slogan. 

In  this  general  revolt  the  Japanese  Christians  were  caught, 
not  only  through  patriotism,  but  through  a  spirit  of  religious 
independence;  they  began  to  fear  they  had  followed  the  mis- 
sionaries too  easily.  The  first  stage  of  Christian  experience 
having  passed,  something  of  the  early  enthusiasm  had  gone 
with  it;  churches  as  a  whole  were  less  earnest  in  the  new  life 
than  in  years  before.  The  theological  controversies  then  dis- 
turbing the  churches  that  maintained  the  Board  unsettled  also 
the  alert  and  mercurial  Japanese.  With  them  it  was  even 
more  a  time  of  questioning  and  doubt;  for  they  had  a  morbid 
fear  of  being  left  in  the  belief  of  something  that  was  old. 

There  was  never  any  danger  that  Christianity  would  be 
entirely  abandoned,  but  there  was  an  intense  desire  to  remake 
it  in  Japan.  The  temper  was  not  an  easy  one  to  deal  with 
or  pleasant  to  experience.  The  missionaries  had  a  rather 
painful  and  testing  time.  Even  to  those  who  best  understood 
the  Japanese  nature,  and  who  sympathized  with  it,  the  situa- 
tion looked  dark  in  the  early  '90s.  The  facts  were  indis- 
putable that  church  services  were  poorl}^  attended,  self-support 
was  increasingly  difficult,  unhappy  frictions  were  rife,  and 
missionaries  and  native  Christians  were  in  many  cases  growing 
apart. 


THE   FARTHER  EAST  359 

Altogether  there  was  a  distinctly  lowered  tone  to  Christianity 
in  the  empire,  with  a  loss  of  prestige  and  power  on  the  part 
of  the  Church.  The  annual  report  of  1892  declares  that 
instead  of  the  missionary  in  Japan  holding  a  reaping  hook, 
Neesima  was  nearer  right  when  he  said,  ''I  have  a  plow  in 
my  hands."  The  question  of  concern  was  as  to  the  fidelity 
of  the  Church,  and  whether,  after  oscillations  of  faith,  she 
would  settle  down  to  a  vital  gospel. 

At  length  relations  became  somewhat  strained  between  the 
Kumi-ai  churches  and  the  mission.  The.  Japanese  were  restive 
of  anything  that  looked  like  direction  or  control.  Some  were 
even  disposed  to  say  that  the  time  had  come  for  the  mission- 
aries to  withdraw.  Professing  gratitude  to  American  Chris- 
tians for  the  aid  rendered,  they  declared  that  they  could  there- 
after largely  dispense  with  it.  This  was  not  the  uniform  or 
prevailing  opinion.  Indeed,  there  was  no  intense  or  general 
ill-feeling  toward  the  missionaries;  only  an  insistent  desire 
to  get  control  into  native  hands. 

And  with  this  desire  the  missionaries  were  in  sympathy. 
From  the  beginning  they  had  encouraged  the  Japanese  in  the 
spirit  of  self-rehance;  every  church  was  self-governing;  the 
Kumi-ai  Missionary  Society  was  independent  of  foreign  con- 
trol, save  in  one  particular;  missionaries  were  never  members 
of  national  or  local  conferences,  except  rarely  when  sent  as 
delegates  by  some  church.  The  point  of  disagreement  came 
over  the  claim  of  the  Japanese  that  the  funds  contributed  by 
the  Board  to  the  work  of  the  Missionary  Society  should  be 
surrendered  unreservedly  to  be  administered  by  them.  This 
the  missionaries,  in  accordance  with  the  established  policy 
of  the  Board,  could  not  allow.  All  were  glad,  therefore,  when 
in  1905,  in  place  of  an  unsatisfactory  arrangement,  whereby  a 
joint  commission  of  foreigners  and  Japanese  managed  these 
funds,  the  Kumi-ai  Missionary  Society  decided,  at  the  sugges- 
tion of  the  mission,  to  depend  on  Japanese  contributions,  and 
proceeded  to  maintain  the  work  which  it  sought  to  direct. 


360  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

A  situation,  tense  for  a  time,  gradually  relaxed  in  the  general 
improvement  of  conditions  until  it  was  forgotten  as  a  bygone 
incident. 

Meanwhile  real  if  covert  influence  against  missionary  work 
was  exerted  by  the  government.  Both  common  soldiers  and 
officers  who  showed  themselves  favorable  to  Chris- 
Q  .  .  tianity  were  discriminated  against;  Christian  judges 
were  debarred  from  promotion;  teachers  were  dis- 
charged simply  for  their  religious  views.  Such  persecution 
was  felt  in  many  places  and  was  openly  approved  by  the 
press.  Private  schools  were  everywhere  discouraged,  not  with- 
out some  reason,  as  there  were  evidently  too  many  of  them; 
yet  the  government  opposition  was  especially  directed  to 
Christian  schools.  And  it  interfered  sadly  with  Christian 
work.  Schools  in  many  places  were  interrupted  or  limited. 
Serious  injury  was  done  to  the  Board's  educational  work, 
particularly  for  girls;  two  schools  of  the  Board,  in  Sendai  and 
Niigata,  were  virtually  compelled  to  close. 

The  changed  situation  as  regards  education  was  felt  most 
keenly  in  the  Doshisha.  In  1890  Joseph  Neesima  died,  worn 
The  out  by  the  unremitting   labor   and   anxieties  with 

Doshisha  which  he  had  wrought  for  the  estabUshment  of  his 
Trouble  ^jg^r  Christian  university.  Four  years  after  his 
death  difficulties  arose  in  the  school.  The  theological  con- 
troversies of  the  day  were  inevitably  felt  in  the  Doshisha,  and 
one  of  the  leading  teachers  not  only  adopted  new  views  in 
extreme  form,  but  bitterly  criticized  those  who  held  the  old 
views.  It  seemed  to  most  of  the  missionaries  impossible  to 
work  in  cooperation  with  such  a  teacher. 

In  connection  with  this  difficulty  and  various  other  problems 
of  the  mission,  the  Board,  in  1895,  sent  a  deputation  consisting 
of  Secretary  Barton,  Hon.  W.  P.  Ellison,  Rev.  James  G.  John- 
son, D.D.,  and  Rev.  A.  H.  Bradford,  D.D.,  to  study  the  condi- 
tion of  the  mission  and  advise  as  to  future  policy,  especially  in 
relation  to  the  Doshisha.     This  deputation  performed  its  task 


THE  FARTHER  EAST  361 

in  a  spirit  of  generosity  and  good-will,  but  failing  to  come  to  a 
satisfactory  agreement  with  the  Japanese  managers  of  the 
school,  who  were  aroused  to  maintain  what  they  regarded  as 
their  due  independence,  it  advised  the  withdrawal  of  financial 
aid  from  the  school  at  the  end  of  the  following  year. 

Meanwhile,  the  trustees  anticipated  this  action  by  declaring 
that  they  would  carry  on  the  school  without  aid  from  the  Board 
either  in  men  or  money,  although  at  the  same  time  they 
requested  the  missionary  teachers  to  remain  in  the  school  as 
private  individuals.  This  being  of  course  impossible,  the  foreign 
teachers  withdrew  in  July,  1896,  and  the  trustees  were  thrown 
upon  their  own  resources.  In  order  to  obtain  privileges  given 
to  schools  recognized  by  the  government,  without  which  they 
had  no  hope  of  being  able  to  carry  on  the  Doshisha,  in  1897 
the  trustees  took  out  of  the  constitution  the  unchangeable 
article  that  the  ethics  taught  there  should  be  based  upon 
Christianity;  at  least  they  restricted  this  article  to  the  theo- 
logical department,  hoping  that  the  remainder  of  the  school, 
thus  being  left  non-religious,  would  receive  the  same  privileges 
as  government  schools.  Their  action  was  met  with  indigna- 
tion by  many  of  the  alumni  and  by  other  Christians  in  the 
Kumi-ai  churches;  a  strong  protest  appeared  in  the  press. 

The  Prudential  Committee  at  once  engaged  counsel  to  repre- 
sent it  in  the  effort  to  recover  the  trust  funds  which  it  was 
claimed  were  thus  being  perverted.  This  effort,  in  which  the 
mission  and  the  Kumi-ai  churches  joined,  was  at  length  suc- 
cessful. Count  Okuma,  who  took  an  intense  interest  in  the 
matter,  saw  at  once  and  was  able  to  make  other  men  in 
high  office  see,  that  Japan  was  not  a  nation  to  be  trusted  by 
the  other  powers  if  its  laws  were  not  able  to  safeguard  funds 
bestowed  for  definite  purposes  or  to  protect  the  rights  of 
foreigners  having  interests  in  the  country.  In  December, 
1898,  the  trustees  of  the  Doshisha  generously  resigned  to 
relieve  the  situation,  a  new  Board  was  elected,  and  a  new 
constitution   adopted,  reaffirming  the  Christian   character  of 


362  STORY   OF  THE  AMERICAN   BOARD 

the  school.  Thereupon  the  way  was  open  for  a  gradual  reorgan- 
ization of  the  Doshisha,  bringing  to  it  once  more  the  loyal 
support  of  the  alumni  and  the  great  body  of  the  Kumi-ai 
churches,  the  cooperation  of  the  missionaries  of  the  Board, 
and  the  recovery  of  its  prestige  and  influence. 

During  these  years  of  depression  and  controversy  there 
had  yet  been  substantial  if  slower  growth  in  the  Japan  Mission. 
Growth  Shut  off  from  much  of  the  preaching  and  teaching 
Under  which  had  formerly  been  open  to  them,  the    mis- 

Diflaculty  sionaries  were  now  able  to  enter  upon  different  lines 
of  work  and  to  visit  new  places;  there  was  more  touring  among 
weak  churches  and  outstations  than  could  be  attempted  before; 
one-half  the  missionary  force  were  then  engaged  in  evangelistic 
work,  a  little  over  one-third  in  educational,  the  rest  in  aUied 
forms  of  Christian  service.  The  preparation  of  an  effective 
Christian  literature  was  always  in  the  thought  of  this  mission; 
now  it  was  yet  more  vigorously  pushed.  Treatises,  text-books, 
and  commentaries,  original  works  and  translations,  appeared 
in  rapid  succession  from  one  or  another  of  the  missionaries, 
and  notably  from  a  group  at  Tokyo,  Doctors  Learned,  Davis, 
Gordon,  Cary,  and  Albrecht.  During  these  years,  also,  new 
churches  were  formed,  new  stations  begun;  so  that  by  1899 
there  had  been  located  twelve  stations  in  large  and  important 
centers  of  commercial  and  political  life  from  Sapporo  to  Miya- 
zaki,  a  distance  of  1000  miles.  The  Hokkaido  was  now  occu- 
pied; the  new  treaties  of  1894-95  opened  the  entire  country  to 
the  missionary. 

The  war  with  China  in  1894  proved  of  advantage  to  the 
missionaries  in  Japan.  Christian  Japanese  could  now  show 
that  they  were  not  deficient  in  patriotism.  Permission  was 
given  to  carry  the  gospel  to  the  soldiers,  and  native  Japanese 
Christians  went  as  chaplains  to  the  seat  of  war.  The  Red 
Cross  Society  made  its  symbol  familiar  to  and  respected  by 
multitudes  of  Japanese.  This  sign,  which  not  many  years 
before  had  been  trampled  on  by  Japanese,  was  now  watched 


THE  FARTHER  EAST  363 

for  with  eager  eyes,  and  opened  the  way  for  nurses  and  mis- 
sionary ladies  to  tell  its  story.  Missionaries  were  able  to 
render  help  in  the  military  headquarters  at  Horoshima. 

In  spite  of  all  distractions,  considerable  additions  to  the 
churches  came  in  these  years.  Kobe  College  for  Girls,  not- 
withstanding the  fact  that  the  period  for  women's  education 
had  not  yet  fully  come,  was  doing  splendid  work,  whose  fruit 
was  to  appear  in  the  brighter  years  afterward.  The  Hok- 
kaido, that  northern  island,  fast  settling  with  hardy  colonists, 
proved  notably  responsive  to  effort.  The  experiences  of  the 
missionaries,  touring  among  these  people,  were  Hke  those  of 
pioneer  missionaries  in  the  western  states  of  this  land. 

The  indirect  influence  of  Christianity  during  these  lean  years 
was  far  beyond  its  numerical  strength.  Buddhism  was 
spurred  to  new  energy  by  its  example.  Some  of  the  coarser 
and  grosser  forms  connected  with  the  life  of  Shintoism  were 
either  suppressed  or  concealed  out  of  respect  to  the  higher 
ideals  which  Christianity  had  stirred  in  the  land.  Another 
striking  testimony  appeared  in  the  parliament  of  1890;  out  of 
300  members,  composing  the  lower  house,  not  less  than  twelve, 
including  the  Speaker,  were  Protestant  Christians;  six  of  them 
members  of  churches  connected  with  the  American  Board 
Mission.  It  was  apparent  that  in  spite  of  discouragements 
and  difficulties  Christianity  had  already  become  a  strong 
force  in  the  land. 

As  the  second  conference  of  Protestant  missionaries  in  Japan, 

held  at  Osaka,  in  1883,  was  the  immediate  occasion  of  that 

swift  increase  which  culminated  in  1888,  so  it  was 

®  ®."  the  third  of  these  conferences,  in  Tokyo,  in  October, 
1900,  that  opened  the  era  of  recovery  after  the 
intervening  years  of  depression.  The  hopes  which  one  and 
another  missionary  had  built  upon  some  event  of  local  impor- 
tance, during  the  last  years  of  the  nineteenth  century,  did 
not  materialize  as  a  general  movement  until  the  beginning  of 
the  twentieth.     But  at  this  conference  the  various  impulses 


364  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

which  had  been  stirring  seemed  to  converge.  It  gave  emphatic 
approval  of  various  measures  looking  toward  advance,  and 
especially  of  union  efforts.  But  the  particular  service  which 
this  conference  rendered,  as  events  proved,  was  its  endorse- 
ment of  a  plan  of  the  Japanese  Evangelical  AlHance  for  a 
special  evangelistic  campaign  throughout  the  empire  during 
the  opening  year  of  the  new  century,  which  was  thereupon 
undertaken.  First  of  all,  a  Sunday  was  set  apart  in  February 
for  preaching  on  the  one  topic,  ''Our  Land  for  Christ."  Pre- 
paratory meetings  then  followed;  the  active  work  was  from 
April  to  July.  Cities  were  systematically  visited,  beginning 
with  Tokyo,  the  capital,  where  over  5000  names  had  been 
enrolled  of  earnest  seekers  after  the  truth.  Methods  new  to 
Christian  work  in  Japan  were  introduced,  such  as  a  parade  of 
the  streets,  with  the  use  of  handbills  and  posters,  not  without 
creating  prejudice  in  some  quarters,  but  with  the  effect  of 
drawing  large  congregations  and  compelling  attention.  During 
this  campaign  over  20,000  were  enrolled  as  converts  or  as 
earnest  inquirers  after  the  truth.  The  permanent  results  are 
hardly  to  be  measured  by  these  figures,  as  the  novel  methods 
used  produced  some  evanescent  enthusiasm;  not  all  who  were 
touched  were  deeply  moved.  Yet  a  new  day  had  dawned  for 
the  gospel  in  Japan.  Christians  were  encouraged;  pastors 
were  brought  back  to  more  direct  evangelistic  preaching;  a 
warmer  religious  life  throbbed  in  the  churches. 

The  Forward  Movement  inspired  many  new  forms  of  relig- 
ious work  like  that  of  the  Bible  Teaching  Band  in  Okayama, 
of  which  Mr.  Ishii  was  the  originator,  with  its  motto,  ''One 
worker,  one  hearer,  one  gospel."  In  various  parts  of  the 
empire,  as  at  Sendai,  the  churches  were  commissioning  bands 
of  workers  to  meet  the  calls  from  outlying  places,  sometimes 
as  far  as  100  miles  away.  This  new  impulse  to  evangelism 
did  not  die  out  with  the  year,  but  settled  into  a  definite  policy 
of  church  work.  In  1903,  when  the  great  National  Exhibition 
was  held  in  Osaka,  a  building  just  outside  the  entrance  was 


THE  FARTHER  EAST  365 

used  for  services,  in  the  conduct  of  which  missionaries  and 
Japanese  Christians  of  all  denominations  united.  Of  the 
4,000,000  who  visited  this  exhibition  it  was  estimated  that 
not  less  than  one-sixteenth  came  under  the  influence  of  these 
evangelistic  meetings. 

The  Japanese  government  was  now  more  kindly  disposed 
toward  Christianity.  Thoughtful  and  high-minded  leaders 
Change  in  ^^  ^^^  nation  began  to  be  disturbed  over  a  moral 
Govern-  lack  in  their  new  educational  system,  intellectually 
ment  so  strong.     The  native  religions  had  become  inefii- 

Attitude  cient;  some  impulse  was  needed  to  redeem  life  from 
irresponsibility  or  despair.  Moreover,  foreigners  had  now 
secured  the  right  to  hold  real  estate  and  the  mission  became 
incorporated  under  the  laws  of  Japan.  Relations  were  more 
cordial  between  the  Educational  Department  and  the  schools 
associated  with  the  mission;  restrictions,  severe  even  so  late 
as  1899,  were  greatly  relaxed  in  1903. 

Japan's  war  with  Russia,  in  1904,  like  that  with  China 
before,  resulted  in  good  to  the  missionary  enterprise.  Japanese 
Effect  of  officials  were  quick  to  see  that  this  conflict  was 
Russian  likely  to  be  represented  as  a  warfare  between  a 
War  Christian  nation   and  one  anti-Christian.     It  was 

important  to  demonstrate  that  Japan  was  hospitable  to 
Christianity,  at  least  as  one  of  the  religions  of  the  land.  The 
course  of  this  war  also  gave  yet  fuller  chance  for  the  Christians 
in  Japan  to  show  their  loyalty  to  the  nation  and  their  allegiance 
to  their  Lord.  Pastors  and  members  of  Kumi-ai  churches, 
with  the  missionaries,  were  among  those  rendering  devoted 
service  on  the  field  or  in  barracks  and  hospitals  at  home.  Dr. 
De  Forest  went,  with  the  emperor's  own  commission,  as  a 
special  worker  among  the  soldiers  at  the  front.  The  outcome 
of  the  war  made  Japan  still  more  tolerant  and  even  cordial 
toward  Christianity.  As  she  took  her  place  in  the  sisterhood 
of  great  nations,  she  was  almost  compelled  to  accord  to  Chris- 
tianity a  place  and  privilege  consonant  with  its  position  in 


366  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

that  world  with  whose  Ufe  she  was  henceforth  to  be  in  full 
touch. 

It  was  now  time  for  a  readjustment  of  the  mission  to  con- 
form to  its  achievement.  From  being  a  foreign  organization^ 
Readjust-  attempting  to  propagate  a  strange  religion  among 
ment  for  a  people  indifferent  if  not  hostile,  it  had  become  an 
Advance  ally,  stimulating  Christianity  as  a  living  and  grow- 
ing force  in  the  land.  The  various  departments  of  work  which 
it  had  instituted  one  after  the  other  were  almost  entirely 
transferred  to  the  Kumi-ai  churches  or  the  Christian  com- 
munity. Medical  work,  publication,  even  the  educational 
institutions,  had  been  gradually  passed  over  until  they  were 
largely  under  Japanese  management,  with  missionaries  assist- 
ing as  teachers  and  instructors  or  serving  on  boards  of  direc- 
tion. Aside  from  the  Woman's  Bible  Training  School,  some 
kindergartens,  and  one  or  two  night  schools,  practically  every- 
thing in  the  field  of  education  was  out  of  the  missionaries' 
hands. 

Their  main  task  was  now  to  be  once  more  what  it  had  been 
at  the  beginning,  evangelism  in  the  broad  sense  of  the  word. 
By  aiding  the  Kumi-ai  churches  in  publishing  the  gospel  more 
widely  and  systematically;  in  service  as  religious  teachers  in 
schools  of  various  grades;  in  editorial  and  literary  work  for 
the  native  publication  society;  in  promoting  various  forms  of 
social  and  philanthropic  service,  and  by  such  private  influence 
as  they  might  quietly  and  effectively  contribute  to  the  Chris- 
tian life  of  the  land,  the  missionaries  were  henceforth  to  find 
their  sufficient  sphere.  Perhaps  the  greatest  contribution  of 
the  Japan  Mission,  not  only  to  the  Christianizing  of  that 
empire,  but  to  the  art  of  modern  missions,  will  be  found  in 
its  developing  of  the  principle  and  method  of  systematic  cooper- 
ation. The  success  of  this  mission  in  adapting  itself  to  the 
sensitive  national  spirit  of  Japan,  and  the  serviceableness  of 
its  missionaries  in  the  evangelization  of  the  land,  are  evidenced 
by  the  fact  that  the  present  appeal  to  the  American  Board 


THE  FARTHER  EAST  367 

to  continue  its  work  there  comes  primarily  from  the  Japanese 
themselves,  voiced  by  such  men  as  Messrs.  Ebina,  Miyagawa, 
and  Harada,  whose  visits  to  this  country  have  shown  the 
ability  and  Christian  devotion  of  the  men  leading  the  Kumi-ai 
churches  to-day. 

In  1905  a  formal  understanding  was  had  between  the  mission 
and  the  churches,  by  which  the  former  was  relieved  within 
three  years  from  all  aid  to  dependent  Kumi-ai  churches,  the 
native  missionary  society  assuming  that  responsibility.  Thirty 
of  these  churches  were  thus  transferred  to  the  care  of  the 
Japanese,  there  being  102  churches  in  all  and  eleven  preaching 
places  at  the  beginning  of  1906,  besides  some  companies  of 
Christians  on  the  way  to  becoming  fully  organized  churches. 
So  the  Kumi-ai  Missionary  Society,  which  had  been  receiving 
from  the  American  Board  three  times  as  much  as  from  its  own 
people,  now  undertook  to  maintain  its  work  from  native 
gifts.  The  gratifying  result  was  a  large  increase  in  funds, 
in  spite  of  the  rather  demoralized  condition  of  the  churches; 
the  receipts  leaped  at  once  to  more  than  300  per  cent  above 
the  highest  mark  of  any  year  preceding.  Thenceforth  there 
was  no  official  relation  between  the  mission  and  the  churches, 
each  working  independently  of  the  other,  but  in  close  coopera- 
tion and  friendship. 

When  the  jubilee  of  Protestant  missions  in  Japan  was  cele- 
brated in  October,  1909,  the  joy  of  the  time  was  not  simply 
over  the  half-century's  effort  of  faith,  but  as  well  over  the 
victory  of  faith  which  had  been  won.  It  could  not  be  reported 
that  Japan  was  yet  Christian  in  any  real  sense;  30,000,000,  or 
three-fifths  of  its  population,  now  scarcely  know  more  than  the 
name  of  Christianity;  whole  provinces  have  no  Christian 
churches  and  few,  if  any,  disciples.  But  Christian  thoughts 
and  ideas  are  abroad  in  the  land;  splendid  examples  of  Chris- 
tian character  and  faith  are  manifest;  careful  Japanese  observers 
have  declared  that  at  least  one  million  of  their  countrymen 
not  church-members  are   seeking  to  order  their  lives   by  the 


368  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

New  Testament.  The  student  body  was  never  so  accessible; 
the  Doshisha  and  other  Christian  schools  are  flourishing; 
respect  for  Christianity  and  regard  for  missions  are  unprece- 
dented. The  Japan  Mail,  commenting  on  the  jubilee,  said 
of  the  missionaries:  ''No  other  body  of  men  have  made  so 
thorough  and  competent  a  study  of  Japanese  affairs,  and  no 
other  Europeans  or  Americans  can  claim  even  an  approxi- 
mately intimate  knowledge  of  Japanese  character."  What  a 
missionary,  returning  from  a  tour  through  Joshu,  reported  of 
that  province  may  be  as  confidently  said  of  the  whole  empire, 
''Indeed,  Christianity  in  Joshu  is  rooted;  it  has  become 
indigenous." 

China 

In  1880  the  Board's  undertaking  in  China,  then  limited  to 
two  fields,  Foochow  and  North  China,  was  hardly  beyond  the 
The  preparatory    stage.     Dr.    Williams,    whose    death 

Time  for  occurred  in  1884  after  eight  years  in  the  homeland. 
Advance  could  testify  that  in  his  forty-three  years  in  the 
empire  he  had  witnessed  immense  and  unimagined  progress. 
Yet  even  his  eye  was  bent  on  the  future  rather  than  the  past; 
shortly  before  his  death  he  declared,  "God  is  going  to  do  a 
work  in  China  within  the  next  few  years  that  will  astonish 
his  Church." 

Judging  by  surface  indications,  the  period  did  not  open 
brilliantly.  At  Foochow  there  was  some  discouragement  that 
so  few  additions  to  the  churches  had  been  received;  mission 
work  seemed  to  be  stationary.  In  North  China  congregations 
were  irregular;  most  of  the  converts  were  very  ignorant;  they 
were  scattered  among  the  villages  and  apt  to  feel  that  once 
received  into  the  church  they  had  been  secured  against  all 
danger.  Yet  advance  was  being  made,  the  zeal  and  purpose 
of  the  missionaries  never  flagged,  and  here  and  there  shining 
witnesses  left  no  doubt  that  the  Chinese  could  be  made  thor- 
oughly loyal  to  Jesus  Christ.     A  native  Christian  physician  in 


THE  FARTHER  EAST  369 

the  new  district  of  Shao-wu  told  the  story  of  the  cross  with 
such  effect  as  to  win  many  disciples  in  his  village;  the  first  visit 
of  a  missionary  there  was  for  the  purpose  of  organizing  a 
church.  The  character  and  service  of  such  men  as  Pastor 
Hou,  at  Pang-Chuang,  and  the  two  Pastors  Meng  at  Pao- 
ting-fu  offset  a  host  of  dubious  and  disappointing  cases. 

All  lines  of  mission  effort  were  now  utihzed.  Street  chapels, 
not  to  be  confounded  with  the  meeting  houses  in  mission 
Broadening  compounds  where  the  native  Christians  assembled, 
Lines  of  but  set  in  the  market  places  where  passers-by  might 
Wo^k  be  attracted  to  come  in,  were  abundantly  effective 

for  the  wide  preaching  of  the  gospel. 

In  no  field  of  the  Board  has  medical  work  been  a  stronger 
factor  than  in  China,  where  it  was  early  established  at  almost 
every  station.  In  1886  there  were  six  trained  physicians, 
three  men  and  three  women,  in  the  North  China  Mission 
alone,  and  two  others  in  Foochow  and  Shansi.  Prominent 
officials  consulted  them  and  even  came  to  the  hospitals  for 
treatment,  often  showing  their  appreciation  by  large  contribu- 
tions. Opium  refuges  now  became  part  of  the  equipment  of 
the  Board's  medical  work  in  all  these  missions,  particularly 
in  the  provinces  of  Shansi  and  Fukien.  These  refuges  were 
often  overcrowded  by  the  number  who  flocked  to  them  for 
help.  In  a  year  at  the  city  station  in  Foochow  more  than 
900  were  thus  reached  and  some  remarkable  cures  effected. 
In  one  instance  the  smokers  left  their  favorite  opium  den  in  a 
body  and  applied  for  healing;  then  the  keeper  of  the  dive, 
finding  his  custom  gone,  was  led  himself  to  seek  a  cure.  The 
experiences  of  the  missionaries  with  these  wretched  victims  of 
opium,  the  awful  struggles  which  they  witnessed,  and  the  way 
in  which  they  were  able  to  bring  many  out  of  their  bondage 
of  shame  into  a  new  life  in  Christ  Jesus,  form  an  impressive 
chapter  in  the  story  of  missionary  labors  and  successes. 

Other  departments  of  work  were  equally  alert.  The  Board's 
recovered  educational  policy  was  marked  in  this  mission  by 


370  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

the  development  of  common  and  middle-grade  schools,  the 
growth  of  the  training-school  at  Tung-chou,  which  was  to 
become  the  North  China  College  in  1893,  and  by  the  growth 
of  the  Bridgman  school  for  girls  in  Peking;  a  similar  enter- 
prise in  this  line  was  manifest  in  Foochow.  Literary  work  was 
being  pushed  at  Peking,  where  Messrs.  Goodrich  and  Sheffield 
were  giving  half  their  time  to  Bible  translation,  the  former 
also  preparing  Sunday-school  lessons  and  translating  hymns, 
while  Dr.  Sheffield  was  revising  a  work  on  theology. 

The  planting  and  equipping  of  new  outstations  and,  at  length, 
even  of  stations,  was  one  result  of  the  prospecting  tours  which 
were  a  feature  of  the  time.  North  China  missionaries  were 
active  in  those  explorations  in  Shansi,  which  led  to  the  opening 
of  the  mission  in  that  province.  Later  in  the  decade  Messrs. 
Chapin  and  Smith  made  one  tour  of  800  miles  through  Chi-fi 
and  Honan,  visiting  thirty  different  walled  cities  and  every- 
where finding  friendliness  to  foreigners  and  opportunities  far 
beyond  the  possibiHties  of  acceptance.  The  great  province 
of  Shangtung  was  entered  in  1880,  first  at  Pang-Chuang  and 
six  years  later  at  Lintsing. 

By  the  close  of  the  decade  the  progress  in  every  line  was 
manifest.  By  this  time  imperial  edicts,  describing  missionaries 
as  teachers  of  virtue  and  enjoining  the  people  to  welcome  and 
live  with  them  as  guests,  were  helping  to  break  down  preju- 
dice. A  native  agency  was  also  forthcoming.  The  eight  first 
graduates  from  the  theological  seminary  in  Tung-chou,  in 
1885,  were  at  once  licensed  as  evangelists,  greatly  reenforcing 
the  few  native  helpers  so  far  available.  The  same  year  the 
Bridgman  school  at  Peking  graduated  six  Christian  girls,  who, 
in  their  way,  were  to  render  as  valued  service.  The  benevo- 
lence of  the  native  churches  was  also  a  substantial  aid  in  the 
development  of  the  work.  In  the  Foochow  Mission  there 
were  now  nine  organized  churches,  boarding  and  day  schools, 
a  hospital  for  men,  in  charge  of  Dr.  Whitney,  and  another  for 
women  and  children,  under  Dr.  Woodhull's  care.     This  form 


THE  FARTHER  EAST  371 

of  woman's  work  for  woman  was  a  new  thing  in  China  and 
at  once  popular.  The  very  day  after  her  arrival  Dr.  Wood- 
hull  was  called  on  for  professional  services  and  the  demand 
never  slackened. 

China's  inglorious  war  with  Japan  was  another  shock  to  her 
immobile  self-esteem.  Humbled  by  its  revelations,  China 
Effect  of  became  more  considerate  of  those  forces  of  the 
War  with  West  which  she  recognized  had  helped  in  the  up- 
Japan  building  of  Japan.     The  year  1893  had  been  marked 

(1894-95)  in  many  ways  in  the  history  of  the  China  mission; 
most  of  all  by  a  deep  revival  of  religion,  appearing  first  at 
Peking  and  Tung-chou,  and  spreading  to  Tientsin  and  other 
points.  Also  in  that  year  North  China  College  was  formally 
organized  and  its  first  buildings  erected.  The  influence  of 
the  religious  awakening  was  felt  particularly  in  the  institutions 
at  Tung-chou,  as  also  in  the  Bridgman  school  in  Peking,  where 
the  girls  had  just  shown  their  enfranchisement  from  burden- 
some traditions  by  the  unbinding  of  their  feet.  Native  pastors 
were  greatly  stimulated  just  as  they  began  to  assume  all  the 
duties  of  the  pastoral  office.  This  was  also  the  banner  year 
so  far  in  the  additions  to  the  churches,  and  schools  showed 
larger  attendance  than  ever  before,  although  payment  of 
tuition  was  now  required  in  many  of  them,  as  in  all  the 
schools  of  Pang-Chuang.  Valued  reenforcements  had  come; 
there  was  a  stir  of  expectancy  everywhere. 

In  the  port  cities  and  near  the  capital  the  war  news  pro- 
duced a  great  impression.  At  Tung-chou,  in  the  very  path 
of  the  war,  the  missionaries  loyally  continued  at  their  work 
with  quietness  and  courage.  Their  behavior,  in  such  contrast 
with  the  selfishness  and  venality  of  the  mass  of  the  people, 
was  an  object  lesson,  not  only  to  the  Christians,  but  to  all  the 
Chinese,  and  called  forth  the  gratitude  of  the  officials. 

All  forms  of  mission  work  were  thus  hastened.  In  North 
China  the  station  classes,  especially  those  for  women,  increased 
rapidly  in  number  and  size;  Miss  Russell  in  the  outstations  of 


372  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

Peking,  Miss  Porter  and  Miss  Wyckoff  in  Pang-Chuang,  Miss 
Morrill  in  the  vicinity  of  Pao-ting-fu,  and  Miss  Andrews  and 
Miss  Evans  in  Tung-chou,  all  found  a  new  welcome  in  Chinese 
homes.  A  generous  gift  made  possible  the  endowment  of 
North  China  College  and  a  chapel  at  Peking;  another  gift 
estabhshed  a  hospital  at  Pang-Chuang.  The  schools  were 
now  systematically  developed  from  the  kindergarten  to  Gordon 
Theological  Seminary. 

In  fact,  the  North  China  Mission  was  more  thoroughly 
organized  than  most  of  the  missions  of  the  Board.  Its  churches 
were  becoming  strong  and  self-reliant;  its  native  pastorate, 
initiated  in  1893,  was  more  than  doubled  during  1898.  The 
work  of  these  native  pastors  was  responsible,  and  it  was 
generally  well  maintained.  They  visited  the  outstations 
twice  a  year,  administered  baptism  and  the  communion, 
received  persons  on  probation,  and  stimulated  contributions. 
Church  members  over  twenty  years  of  age  and  in  good  stand- 
ing were  given  certificates  bearing  a  foreign  stamp  and  renew- 
able annually.  North  China  College  and  Gordon  Theological 
Seminary  were  turning  out  preachers  and  Christian  workers 
of  high  grade  and  in  increasing  numbers.  Many  of  the  scholars 
in  the  lower,  no  less  than  in  the  higher  grade  schools  showed 
conspicuous  ability  and  devotion.  One  convert,  a  blacksmith, 
nineteen  years  old,  who  had  never  been  to  school,  mastered 
the  primer  in  three  days,  and  in  three  days  more  the  Chinese 
reader,  the  creed,  and  the  covenant.  Over  the  Gospel  of  John 
he  exclaimed,  ''The  more  I  read  this,  the  hotter  my  heart 
becomes.'' 

At  Foochow,  as  in  North  China,  the  pace  was  quicken- 
ing. A  new  attentiveness  was  seen;  entire  villages  came, 
asking  for  teachers;  they  offered  support,  and  the  opening 
of  temples  for  schools  and  for  public  worship,  a  new  thing  in 
the  empire,  but  soon  to  become  common.  This  oldest  mission 
of  the  Board  in  China  was  now  quite  beyond  the  stage  of 
beginnings.     In    1899  the  laborers  could  report,  "The   story 


THE  FARTHER  EAST  373 

of  this  field  for  the  past  three  years  reads  like  successive  chap- 
ters in  the  Acts  of  the  Apostles."  The  gain  in  church  member- 
ship during  1899  was  more  than  the  total  number  of  members 
in  the  mission  seven  years  before.  Nine  of  the  churches  were 
self-supporting,  some  of  them  having  branches  and  mission 
enterprises  of  their  own;  the  people  were  assuming  an  even 
larger  share  of  the  cost  of  their  children's  education.  Chapels 
and  schools  were  filled  to  overflowing;  the  seventy  preaching 
places  had  increased  to  105,  and  instead  of  thirty-nine  churches 
there  were  now  fifty-nine.  At  the  interior  stations  of  Shao-wu 
alone  there  were  5000  inquirers,  with  1500  more  reported  in 
places  beyond,  never  yet  visited  by  a  missionary.  The  move- 
ment toward  Christianity  was  gaining  momentum.  A  theolog- 
ical school  with  twenty-four  students  failed  to  provide  men  as 
rapidly  as  new  locations  were  opened. 

In  Shansi  it  was  still  the  time  of  seed  sowing;  with  small 
outward  results,  but  with  vast  patience  and  industry  on  the 
part  of  a  depleted  and  harassed  mission.  South  China  had  a 
strong  church  center  at  Hong  Kong  and  educational  work 
was  also  developing  far  beyond  what  had  been  intended  for 
this  mission. 

In  1898  a  deputation,  consisting  of  Secretary  Judson  Smith, 
Col.  C.  A.  Hopkins  of  the  Prudential  Committee,  and  Presi- 
dent Edward  D.  Eaton  of  Beloit,  the  first  representatives  of 
the  Board  to  inspect  its  work  in  China  during  the  sixty-eight 
years  since  it  was  begun,  visited  one  after  another  these  four 
missions.  They  reported  that  they  saw  little  to  criticize  or  to 
reverse;  much  over  which  to  wonder  and  rejoice.  There  was 
need  of  more  adequate  equipment  in  many  lines,  and  they  felt 
the  importance  of  developing  yet  more  determinedly  the  native 
agency.  The  educational  work  of  the  mission,  in  particular 
at  Tung-chou  and  Foochow,  called  forth  their  admiration. 

When  missionary  work,  not  only  under  the  American  Board, 
but  on  all  the  mission  fields  of  China,  was  thus  exhilarating 
in  its   progress,   a  storm   of  persecution  broke  over  a  large 


374  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

portion  of  the  empire,   unmatched  in  the  history  of  modern 

missions.     The  American  Board   had  never   endured  such  a 

blow.     Though  sudden  in  its  outbreak,  the  storm 
The 
^  had  been  slowly  gathering.     The  coup  d'etat  by  which 

the  empress  dowager  seized  the  reins  of  government 
from  the  hands  of  the  emperor,  upon  his  sweeping  edicts  of 
reform  in  1898,  encouraged  reactionary  plottings.  The  Lega- 
tions seemed  unable  to  read  the  signs  of  the  time.  Many  of 
the  missionaries,  who  lived  closer  to  the  people,  could  feel  the 
subtle  changes  going  on  beneath  the  surface,  and  warned 
vainly  of  the  danger  ahead.  Following  local  disturbances  in 
various  quarters  in  1898-99,  more  violent  outbreaks  revealed 
a  mysterious  sect,  bound  by  religious  and  patriotic  oaths. 
Novitiates  practised  a  mixed  regimen  of  athletics,  military 
drill,  and  hypnotism,  after  which  they  claimed  no  sword  could 
cut  them,  no  bullet  pierce  their  body,  no  soldiers  prevail  against 
them.  After  what  were  called  demonstrations  of  their  invul- 
nerability, the  fear  and  fascination  of  them  spread  widely. 
Their  title,  ''Boxers,"  which  out  of  several  names  came  to 
be  accepted,  expresses  the  idea  suggested  by  their  common 
Chinese  name,  ''Fists  of  righteous  harmony";  by  force  these 
fanatics  sought  to  reinstate  the  ancient  customs. 

The  governor  of  Shangtung  at  that  time,  Yli  Hsien,  gave  his 
official  support  to  these  bands,  which  soon  became  riotous 

mobs,  destroying  property,  beating  Christians, 
g    , .  threatening  all  foreigners  and  spreading  terror  and 

want  wherever  they  made  their  raids.  The  work 
at  both  the  Board's  stations  in  Shangtung,  Pang-Chuang  and 
Lintsing,  was  interrupted,  as  many  villages  were  looted  and 
Christians  robbed  of  all  their  possessions.  Forced  out  of 
Shangtung  upon  a  change  of  governors,  the  Boxers  went  north- 
ward into  Chi-li,  adding  to  their  numbers  and  their  fury  as 
they  went.  High  officials  were  still  encouraging  them.  At 
length  it  appeared  that  the  empress  dowager  herself  was  the 
patroness  of  their  order,  attaching  their  supposed  superhuman 


THE  FARTHER  EAST  375 

power  and  religious  sanction  to  her  purpose  to  wipe  from 
China  all  foreign  life  and  influence.  The  animating  spirit  of 
the  Boxers  was  anti-foreign;  anti-Christian,  in  part,  but  not 
primarily  or  markedly  anti-missionary.  Railroad  engineers 
and  other  advance  agents  of  civilization  were  even  more  cor- 
dially hated. 

With  their  coming  into  the  imperial  province,  the  stations 
at  Pao-ting-fu,  Tientsin,  Peking,  Tung-chou,  and  Kalgan  were 
threatened.  The  Embassies  at  Peking  now  bestirred  them- 
selves to  make  inquiries  and  to  send  out  warnings,  but  it  was 
too  late.     In  June  of  1900  the  tempest  broke. 

When  the  Boxers  fell  upon  Tung-chou  they  slew  with  the 
sword  more  than  half  its  church  members,  the  rest,  with  all 
who  were  associated  with  the  mission,  abandoning 
M  sa  es  ^^^^^  homes  and  fleeing  to  hiding-places.  All  the 
buildings  of  the  station  were  despoiled  and  demol- 
ished, not  one  brick  being  left  upon  another;  the  college  campus 
was  plowed  and  sowed  with  corn.  The  annual  meeting  of  the 
American  Board's  mission  was  held  that  June  in  the  city  of 
Tung-chou.  As  it  broke  up  on  June  5  some  of  the  members 
were  able  to  make  their  way  back  to  Peking,  while  three,  two 
men  and  a  woman,  a  physician,  pushed  their  way  to  Kalgan, 
where  they  arrived  safely  four  days  later,  to  find  themselves 
surrounded  by  a  mob,  their  dwellings  threatened,  and  their 
only  temporary  refuge  the  yamen.  Unable  to  stay  there,  they 
were  compelled  to  attempt  the  perilous  trip  through  Mongolia, 
across  the  Gobi  desert,  by  which,  after  almost  overwhelming 
dangers  and  anxieties,  they  arrived  safely  in  Europe. 

The  missionaries  bound  for  Tientsin,  finding  the  river  route 
unsafe,  delayed  for  more  favorable  news  from  Peking.  But 
by  the  7th  it  became  necessary  to  risk  flight  from  Tung-chou, 
and  Dr.  Ament,  who  came  in  late  at  night  with  a  train  of 
Peking  carts,  no  guard  having  been  furnished  him,  piloted 
the  company  of  twenty-four  Americans,  with  a  considerable 
number  of  native  Christians,  safely  over  the  twelve  miles  to 


376  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

the  capital.  A  few  hours  later  such  a  journey  would  have 
been  impossible,  as  it  might  indeed  have  been  then  had  not 
the  taotai  of  Tung-chou  put  secret  guards  along  the  way. 

Once  in  Peking,  the  Americans  went  first  to  the  compound 
of  the  Methodist  Mission.  As  the  danger  increased,  all  were 
driven  to  the  common  shelter  of  foreigners  in  the  British 
Legation.  The  story  of  this  retreat  to  the  Legation,  with 
but  a  few  moments  in  which  to  snatch  the  most  necessary 
articles,  followed  by  a  pathetic  procession  filing  into  quarters 
whence  no  one  knew  whether  they  would  ever  come  out  alive, 
makes  a  stirring  chapter  in  China's  missionary  history.  Here 
they  stayed,  men,  women,  and  children,  missionaries  and  Chris- 
tian Chinese,  from  June  20  to  August  14,  crowded  together,  on 
short  rations,  keeping  incessant  watch,  counseling  continually 
as  to  better  measures  of  defense,  seeing  the  sky  lurid  at  night, 
with  the  fires  destroying  foreign  buildings,  including  their  loved 
mission  premises,  and  hearing  the  cry  of  the  mob  surging 
against  the  wall,  "Kill,  kill,  kill!" 

The  bravery,  cheerfulness,  and  faith  of  the  missionaries  in 
this  stress  won  the  admiration  of  the  diplomats  and  soldiers 
as  they  waited  together  for  the  allied  armies  to  force  their 
way  in.  After  the  lifting  of  the  siege.  United  States  Minister 
Conger  sent  an  expression  of  thanks  to  the  missionaries  for 
their  aid  and  for  that  of  the  Chinese  Christians  to  whom  he 
believed  the  preservation  of  all  lives  was  due.  About  all  the 
responsible  news  obtainable  as  to  the  progress  of  the  army 
came  through  the  reports  of  some  devoted  Christian  natives 
serving  as  spies. 

While,  within  the  walls  of  Peking,  this  company  waited  for 
the  army  of  relief,  the  Boxers  were  ravaging  the  country  out- 
side, venting  their  fury  upon  mission  stations  and  all  asso- 
ciated with  them.  Thousands  of  native  Christians  in  all  the 
centers,  including  Peking  and  its  outstations,  were  horribly 
slain,  men,  women,  and  children  alike;  others  were  driven 
into  hiding,  many  to  be  hunted  out  like  rats  in  their  holes. 


THE  FARTHER  EAST  377 

Kalgan  and  Pao-ting-fu  were  devastated;  later  Lintsing  also. 
At  Tientsin,  the  center  of  the  fiercest  conflict  between  the 
Chinese  and  the  army  of  the  allies,  the  slaughter  of  Christians 
was  not  quite  so  sweeping  as  at  Peking. 

Pao-ting-fu  suffered  heaviest  of  all,  as,  after  being  threatened 
and  terrorized  for  weeks  and  seeing  the  outstations,  one  after 
another,  demolished,  with  the  slaughter  of  Christian  Chinese, 
while  local  authorities  evaded  or  disclaimed  responsibility, 
suddenly  all  the  missionaries  in  the  city,  including  the  three 
of  the  American  Board,  were  ruthlessly  slain,  their  bodies 
being  dismembered  and  burned.  The  heroism  of  Horace 
Pitkin,  in  protecting  as  long  as  possible  Miss  Gould  and  Miss 
Morrill,  and  the  splendid  devotion  of  Pastor  Meng,  are  points 
of  hght  in  the  dark  scene.  Pastor  Meng,  being  absent  when 
the  Boxers  attacked  Pao-ting-fu,  insisted  against  every  protest 
on  returning  to  help  the  missionaries  there,  and,  upon  marvel- 
ously  reaching  the  city,  remained  with  them  undaunted  till, 
two  days  before  the  rest  were  slain,  he  and  his  wife  and  all 
but  one  of  his  five  children  were  put  to  death. 

It  was  natural  that  this  carnival  of  fanatic  hate  should 

reach  its  climax  amid  the  intenser  superstition  and  ignorance 

of  the  interior  provinces.     So  Shansi  suffered  most 

.  eu  •  in  the  Boxer  outbreak.  The  mission  of  the  Ameri- 
in  bnansi 

can  Board  was  absolutely  wiped  out;  every  person 
connected  with  it  was  put  to  death,  no  help  being  able  to  come 
in  and  flight  being  impossible  after  the  necessity  for  it  was 
made  sure.  Nearly  half  the  native  Christians  went  down 
with  the  missionaries.  The  mission  premises  at  Taiku  were 
razed  to  the  ground,  the  government  confiscating  those  at 
Fen-cho-fu.  The  merciless  Yii  Hsien,  who  had  been  governor 
of  Shangtung  when  the  Boxers  began  their  outrages,  was  now 
governor  of  Shansi,  and  was  once  more  able  to  give  the  maraud- 
ers his  sympathy  and  protection.  Seven  years  after  that 
July  31,  1900,  which  saw  the  slaughter  at  Taiku,  there  was 
brought  to  a  meeting    by  the  martyrs'   graves.  Miss    Susan 


378  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

Bird's  diary,  which  had  been  found  for  sale  in  a  second-hand 
shop.  And  there  was  read  the  pathetic  record  of  the  time 
when  the  Httle  company  waited  behind  the  feeble  barrier  of  the 
compound,  not  knowing  what  a  day  might  bring  forth,  whether 
it  should  be  death  or  escape,  but,  learning  at  last,  as  the  journal 
says,  that  "all  the  bad  reports  seemed  to  be  true  and  all  the 
good  ones  false."  The  entries  ceased  on  July  19,  twelve  days 
before  the  terrible  end,  a  mute  suggestion  of  what  men  and 
women  endured  who  then  laid  down  their  hves  for  the  gospel. 

The  missions  to  the  south,  though  disturbed  and  losing 
some  property,  yet  suffered  comparatively  little,  as  the  prov- 
inces they  occupied  were  able  to  prevent  the  Boxers'  full 
attack. 

When  the  alUed  armies  broke  into  Peking  and  the  court 
fled  1000  miles  into  the  interior,  the  illusions  of  the  Boxers' 
Collapse  invulnerability  and  of  China's  easy  supremacy  over 
at  Last  of  all  other  nations  disappeared  like  dew.  It  was 
the  Boxer  clear  even  to  China  that  she  could  not  safely  defy 
Movement  ^]^g  j.^^^  Qf  ^]^g  world  or  disregard  solemn  treaties. 
Before  a  year  had  elapsed  her  statesmen  and  even  the  empress 
dowager  herself  had  decided  to  adopt  a  saner  policy;  they 
would  seek  the  advantage  of  living  on  good  terms  with  those 
with  whom  they  must  live  on  some  terms. 

With  the  assurance  of  indemnities,  which  were  duly  paid, 
the  work  of  reestablishment  was  only  a  question  of  time. 
Now  the  havoc  which  had  been  wrought  became  yet  more 
apparent.  Of  the  Peking  church  and  its  branches,  170  mem- 
bers were  known  to  have  been  killed;  many  others  were  missing; 
in  one  of  the  outstation  churches  fifty-three  out  of  sixty-five 
members  were  slain.  Dr.  Dennis  estimates  that  in  these  mas- 
sacres there  were  put  to  death  not  less  than  188  Protestant 
missionaries  and  their  children,  and  forty-four  of  Roman 
Catholic  connection;  several  thousand  native  Christians,  in- 
cluding both  Protestants  and  Catholics,  perished  in  the 
same  way. 


THE  FARTHER  EAST  379 

Inasmuch  as  in  many  cases  these  hunted  disciples  could 
have  escaped  the  butchery  by  a  word  or  sign,  the  sincerity 
of  their  faith  and  their  capacity  for  self-sacrifice  are  apparent. 
It  was  inevitable  that  in  such  a  reign  of  terror  many  should 
recant  or  evade;  the  wonder  is  at  the  multitude  that  endured 
even  unto  death,  and  at  the  no  less  heroic  souls  who  in  count- 
less hiding-places  in  the  land  held  true  during  the  months  of 
want  and  danger. 

The  work  of  reconstruction  was  begun  so  soon  as  order  was 

established   at   the    capital.     Herein   Dr.    Ament    in    Peking 

proved  himself  a  wise  and  effective  leader.     Through 

.'         all  the  region  round  about,  with  tireless  patience 

and  devotion,  he  restored  refugees  to  their  villages 

and  aided  them  in  rebuilding  their  homes.     The  testimony  of 

all  with  whom  he  had  to  deal  in  the  difficult  and  perplexing 

negotiations  of  the  time,  —  officials,  the  Christians  whose  claims 

he  pressed,  and  those  upon  whom  he  pressed  them,  —  was  a 

sufficient  answer  to  such  criticisms  of  ignorance  or  of  injustice 

as  were  passed  upon  him  on  this  side  of  the  water. 

Rebuilding  was  soon  begun  and  missionary  work  resumed. 
Services  were  maintained  almost  at  once  in  Peking,  Tientsin, 
and  Pao-ting-fu;  somewhat  later,  at  Pang-Chuang,  Lintsing, 
Tung-chou,  and  Kalgan.  It  was  found  possible  to  enlarge 
the  mission  compound  both  at  Peking  and  Pao-ting-fu;  at 
Tung-chou  a  more  ample  site  was  secured,  and  missionary 
residences  were  soon  erected  and  a  part  of  College  Hall,  suffi- 
cient to  house  the  students  while  beginning  the  work  again. 
At  the  end  of  three  years  the  college  premises  were  in  better 
order  than  before  the  Boxer  trouble.  At  Pang-Chuang  the 
buildings  had  been  untouched,  but  the  Christians  were  some- 
what demoralized  with  the  long  unsettled  conditions  and  the 
element  of  time  was  needed  to  restore  courage  and  hope.  The 
impressive  fact  was  that  the  missionaries  found  a  welcome 
wherever  they  went.  The  hatred  which  the  Boxers  had  so 
suddenly  evoked    had  as    suddenly  vanished.     It  was  easier 


380  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

than  before  to  get  access  to  the  people  and  to  secure  respectful 
consideration  from  officials  and  men  of  influence. 

Shansi,  bereaved  of  all  its  missionaries  who  were  on  the 
ground,  and  more  remote  from  the  center  of  reconstruction  at 
Peking,  was  naturally  somewhat  slower  in  recovery.  But  Dr. 
Atwood,  whose  absence  from  the  country  during  the  massacres 
left  him  the  only  surviving  member  of  this  mission,  visited  the 
field  by  1902,  recovered  the  remains  of  his  associates  and  the 
church  members,  and  gave  them  honorable  burial,  with  the 
Chinese  authorities  in  attendance,  expressing  their  sorrow  for 
what  had  been  done.  With  reparation  for  material  losses,  the 
mission  was  better  provided  with  buildings  and  grounds  than 
ever  before.  Native  leaders  were  able  to  resume  missionary 
work,  and  the  coming  of  new  missionaries  was  eagerly  desired. 
The  railroad,  already  half  way  completed  from  Pao-ting-fu  to 
Taiku,  was  gradually  making  an  easier  access  to  Shansi. 

Instead  of  extirpating  the  Board's  mission  in  China  the  Boxer 
movement  really  established  it  on  a  firmer  footing.  During 
A  Decade  ^^®  years  since,  in  common  with  other  missions 
of  Mar-  in  the  country,  it  has  developed  at  an  astonishing 
velous  rate,  and  in  an  era  when  there  is  being  wrought 

Advance        practically  the  reorganization  of  the  empire. 

Five  years  after  the  Boxers  w^ere  rioting  over  Chi-li  the 
viceroy  of  that  imperial  province  had  established  over  5000 
schools  of  primary  and  secondary  grade;  a  sudden  and  surpris- 
ing increase,  reacting  strongly  on  mission  schools  and  enabling 
them  to  furnish  teachers  and  leaders  in  educational  lines  for 
the  new  China. 

In  many  ways  a  transformation  has  been  wrought  in  the 
empire.  In  Tientsin  the  newspapers  jumped  from  three  to 
twenty-three  in  number  within  four  years  in  the  first  of  the 
decade.  A  decree  commanding  parents  not  to  bind  the  feet 
of  their  daughters  has  already  accomplished  its  purpose  and 
set  the  new  fashion  in  the  empire.  In  like  manner  an  anti- 
opium  decree,  thought  to  be  a  mere  form  of  words  when  it 


^\v  -^^B^^A  ^^^H 

^ni 

P"'  i»i^sl    •> 1 

!«  iHllflJIjII^*^ 

CHURCH    AND    MARTYR    CEMETERY,    PAO-TING-FU 


MEMORIAL    ARCH,    OBERLIN  COLLEGE 

TWO   BOXER   MEMORIALS 


THE  FARTHER  EAST  381 

appeared  in  1896,  has  already  revolutionized  the  situation 
in  some  of  the  cities  and  provinces.  In  Shansi,  frightfully 
cursed  with  opium  when  the  missionaries  entered  it,  one  who 
traveled  widely  through  its  territory  in  1909  saw  not  a  single 
field  of  poppies;  everywhere  wheat  was  taking  its  place. 

And  in  this  new  awakening,  China  is  in  increasing  degree 
tolerant  if  not  cordial  to  Christian  work.  A  new  favor  and 
regard  have  been  often  shown  to  the  missionaries,  even  by 
officials  and  representative  people  in  the  cities  as  well  as  by 
country  folk.  In  particular,  the  return  by  the  United  States 
of  the  surplus  of  indemnity  funds  paid  by  China  after  the 
massacres  has  added  to  the  prestige  of  America,  and  so  of 
American  missions.  It  is  no  wonder  that  the  reorganization 
has  been  swift.  In  less  than  three  years  after  the  Boxers' 
devastation  mission  schools  and  seminaries  in  Chi-li  had 
nearly  regained  their  former  numbers;  the  hospitals  were 
again  thronged;  churches  were  reestablished  with  Christian 
leaders,  the  church  at  Pao-ting-fu  having  for  its  new  pastor 
a  younger  brother  of  that  Mr.  Meng  who  laid  down  his  fife 
in  the  effort  to  defend  the  missionaries. 

By  1905  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Corbin  had  arrived  in  Taiku,  the 
first  missionaries  to  settle  anew  in  the  Shansi  field.  There- 
upon the  work  began  to  develop  in  that  interior  province 
quite  as  rapidly  as  in  those  stations  nearer  the  capital.  The 
years  since  have  shown  the  eagerness  of  many  Chinese  of 
that  province  to  secure  whatever  blessings  Christianity  has 
to  bestow.  Teachers  in  government  schools  advise  their 
scholars  to  go  to  the  mission  church,  which  unfortunately 
is  already  overcrowded.  The  hearts  of  the  missionaries  are 
divided  between  exultation  over  the  opportunity  and  dismay 
at  the  inadequate  equipment  for  so  great  an  hour.  The 
organization  at  Oberlin  of  the  Shansi  Memorial  Association, 
in  1907,  links  the  work  of  this  mission  yet  more  closely  with 
the  college  with  which  from  the  first  it  has  been  peculiarly  associ- 
ated and  promises  to  it  a  larger  and  yet  more  loyal  support. 


382  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

In  the  south  the  same  quickened  conditions  have  appeared. 
When  Foochow  Mission,  in  1907,  celebrated  its  jubilee,  it 
could  look  out  with  great  satisfaction  on  the  growth  that 
had  been  made.  The  native  Christians  were  alert  and  aggres- 
sive. Churches  and  chapels  were  numbered  by  the  hundred, 
with  pastors,  some  of  them  remarkable  men,  coming  forth  from 
the  schools  and  colleges  to  man  them.  The  colleges  for  men 
and  for  girls  are  among  the  best  that  China  can  show  and 
constitute  a  force  of  immense  significance  in  this  enterpris- 
ing province  of  Fukien.  In  1908  the  doing  away  of  idol  pro- 
cessions and  idol  celebrations  released  the  Christians  from  a 
nagging  persecution. 

The  South  China  Mission  also  is  astir.  The  Ruth  Norton 
Girls'  School  at  Canton  has  come  into  great  favor;  more  than 
100  pupils,  many  of  them  from  influential  families,  desiring 
to  enter,  have  had  to  be  turned  away  in  the  later  years.  A 
new  church,  erected  in  Hong  Kong  without  aid  from  the 
Board,  is  becoming  a  center  of  religious  life  and  activity.  The 
plant  for  the  mission  at  Canton,  erected  in  1901,  has  amply 
provided  for  the  needs  of  the  station  there.  The  celebration 
of  the  Morrison  centennial  in  that  city,  in  1907,  was  a  three 
days'  convocation  which  brought  together  the  largest  gathering 
of  Protestants  ever  seen  in  the  city,  if  not  in  all  China.  The 
huge  bamboo  shelter  built  on  the  river  bank,  with  seats  for 
3000,  was  altogether  insufficient  for  the  representative  assembly. 

Here,  as  elsewhere,  temples  are  being  suffered  to  fall  into 
disrepair,  and  the  people,  convinced  of  the  futility  of  the 
temple  services  and  ways,  have  grown  bold  to  cast  out  the 
idols  into  the  street,  sometimes  even  sweeping  them  into  holes 
by  the  roadside. 

Signs  of  a  great  opportunity  appear  in  all  the  provinces 
where  the  Board  has  missions.  Near  Lintsing  recently,  in  a 
large  region  comprising  one  whole  county  and  portions  of 
several  others,  inquirers  came  by  the  hundred,  eager  for  mis- 
sionary instruction,   and  ready  to  follow  the  Word  as  they 


THE  FARTHER  EAST  383 

learned  it.  Seven  new  outstations  were  opened,  and  tours 
made  by  the  missionary  reached  as  many  as  fifteen  villages 
at  a  time.  The  sincerity  of  the  movement  was  evidenced  by 
the  number  of  changed  lives  in  which  idolatry,  gambling,  and 
the  use  of  opium  were  abandoned  under  the  constraint  of  the 
new  way. 

The  deputation  of  1907,  consisting  of  Prof.  Edward  C. 
Moore,  D.D.,  of  the  Prudential  Committee,  and  Secretary 
Barton,  after  protracted  investigation  of  the  several  missions 
with  a  view  to  advising  upon  readjustments  required  by  the 
new  times,  were  most  impressed  with  the  size  and  influence 
to  which  the  Board's  work  in  China  had  grown  in  a  few  swift 
years. 

It  was  natural  that  those  who  had  been  brought  close  together 
in  the  suffering  and  strain  of  massacre  days  and  in  the  siege  of 
Union  Peking  should  find  it  easier  thereafter  to  plan  for 

Move-  cooperative    work.     And    the    great    conference    at 

ments  Shanghai,  in  1907,  marking  the  centenary  of  Mor- 

rison's beginning  of  mission  work  in  China,  gave  opportunity 
for  careful  study  of  the  situation  and  impetus  to  the  planning 
of  united  effort.  The  size  and  scope  of  this  conference,  in 
which  were  gathered  nearly  500  appointed  delegates,  represent- 
ing fifty-one  organizations  doing  mission  work  in  China,  was 
an  object  lesson,  not  only  to  the  Chinese,  but  to  the  whole 
Christian  world,  that  Christianity  has  fairly  undertaken  the 
religious  conquest  of  this  empire.  From  this  conference  the 
missionaries  went  back  to  their  several  fields,  not  only  with 
a  fresh  determination  to  do  each  his  own  part,  but  with  a 
new  sense  of  the  common  task. 

The  union  work  in  which  the  American  Board  is  most  signifi- 
cantly associated  at  present  has  Peking  for  its  center.  Here 
several  higher  institutions  of  learning  have  been  combined 
in  a  simple  plan,  by  which  each  Board  provides  the  plant  and 
equipment  for  the  institution  it  owns,  while  all  unite  in  sup- 
plying teachers,  running  expenses  being  divided  among  the 


384  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

missions  according  to  the  number  of  students  each  furnishes. 
In  this  united  way  a  group  of  four  schools  is  now  in  operation: 
the  North  China  Union  Arts  College,  in  the  suburb  of  Tung- 
chou,  built  by  the  American  Board;  the  North  China  Union 
Medical  College,  built  by  the  London  Missionary  Society;  the 
North  China  Union  Theological  College,  built  by  the  American 
Presbyterian  Mission;  the  Union  Woman's  College,  built  by 
the  American  Board.  The  American  Methodist  Mission  joins 
in  the  plan,  so  far  as  the  Union  Medical  College  is  concerned, 
and  the  North  China  Woman's  Union  Medical  College,  to  be 
built  and  equipped  by  the  Methodist  Woman's  Board,  is  already 
ratified  by  the  Board  of  Managers  in  China.  This  arrange- 
ment, inaugurated  in  1904,  has  worked  smoothly  and  gives 
encouragement  that  such  combinations  in  the  interests  of 
economy  and  efficiency  can  be  made  elsewhere  in  the  empire. 
Indeed,  their  beginnings  are  already  to  be  found  in  other  of 
the  Board's  Chinese  missions. 


Chapter  XXI 

THE  NEARER  EAST 

By  1880  the  officers  of  the  Board  were  thinking  that  they 
might  soon  close  mission  work  among  the  Armenians.  Other 
Attempt  at  races  were  calling  for  attention:  ambitious  Bul- 
With-  garians,    Greeks    in    Asia  Minor,  Arabs    in    Meso- 

drawal  potamia,     and     every^vhere     Turks,     now     better 

understood,  and  for  whom  one-third  of  the  missionaries  and 
the  native  agency  were  prepared  to  labor  if  the  way  should 
open.  Evangelical  Christianity  was  thoroughly  acclimated 
and  vigorous;  there  were  nearly  100  churches,  with  over  6000 
members,  and  thirty-nine  schools  of  higher  learning  up  to 
college  grade;  including  the  students  at  Robert  College,  at 
least  1000  young  men  were  securing  advanced  education. 
More  Christian  women  were  laboring  for  their  sex  in  Turkey 
than  in  any  other  field  of  the  Board. 

In  spite  of  this  growth  the  hope  of  withdrawing  from  the 
Armenians  was  not  soon  to  be  fulfilled.  The  effort  to  press 
responsibility  and  self-support  upon  the  evangelical  churches, 
in  order  to  set  free  missionary  forces  for  other  races,  produced 
some  misunderstandings  and  complaints.  At  the  same  time 
the  rising  spirit  of  independence  among  these  churches  led 
them  to  claim  for  their  organizations  control  of  mission  funds 
to  be  expended  for  their  benefit.  There  was  friction  between 
the  native  pastors  and  the  mission,  and  some  division  of  opinion 
among  the  missionaries  themselves.  At  last  an  important 
conference  was  held  at  Constantinople  in  May,  1883,  com- 
posed of  representatives  of  the  four  Turkish  missions  and  of 
the   churches,   and  a  deputation  from  the  Prudential   Com- 

385 


388  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

mittee,  together  with  a  special  committee  appointed  by  the 
Board  itself.  For  weeks  preceding,  both  on  the  field  and  in 
the  homeland,  prayer  was  offered  for  this  conference,  which 
was  felt  to  be  of  critical  importance.  And  before  its  sessions 
began  there  occurred  such  a  religious  quickening  as  had  never 
been  known  in  the  Turkish  missions;  it  covered  all  the  field 
of  Asiatic  Turkey,  particularly  the  Central  Turkey  Mission, 
and  was  manifest  also  at  Samokov.  The  gracious  influence 
continued  and  increased  after  the  conference  with  memorable 
results.  Here,  again,  the  work  for  women  by  women  was 
notable;  at  Harpoot  crowds  of  women  thronged  about  Miss 
Bush  and  Miss  Seymour  to  hear  the  gospel,  and  missionaries 
at  other  stations  had  similar  experiences. 

When  the  conference  met,  it  found  a  new  spirit  of  self-denial 
and  evangelistic  zeal  that  entirely  relieved  the  situation. 
Attendance  upon  the  sessions  was  felt  to  be  a  religious  experi- 
ence of  highest  value.  Judgments  were  more  unanimous  than 
had  been  thought  possible;  on  the  one  hand,  it  was  recognized 
that  American  Christians  could  not  attempt  to  meet  all  the 
needs  of  Armenian  churches,  pastors,  and  institutions;  at  the 
same  time,  as  the  situation  was  studied  on  the  ground,  it  was 
seen  that  these  oppressed  evangelical  communities  could  not 
become  quickly  independent  of  foreign  aid.  The  conference 
had  only  to  strengthen  and  encourage  movements  already 
widely  begun  and  to  formulate  such  principles  as  should  safe- 
guard the  rights  and  interests  of  all  concerned;  viz.,  that  the 
mission  should  administer  all  funds  received  from  the  Board, 
while  the  contributions  of  the  native  churches  should  be  under 
their  direction.  Strained  relations  were  relieved,  and  the 
clouds  which,  as  they  gathered,  seemed  so  portentous,  passed 
safely  over.  The  policy  then  outlined  became  generally 
adopted  throughout  the  Board's  missions;  though  as  the  spirit 
of  cooperation  developed,  it  was  to  be  somewhat  modified  in 
operation,  as  particularly  in  the  Central  Turkey  Mission. 

The  Turkish  government  now  began  to  show  renewed  hos- 


THE  NEARER  EAST  387 

tility.     The  slightest  extension  of  work  outside  the  Christian 
communities  was  resented;  in  some  places  churches  and  school- 
houses  could  not  be  built.     Here  and  there  violence 

Frssh 

Obstacles  ^^^  ^^^*'  ^  storm  of  persecution  broke  in  1886 
at  Marash,  and,  although  the  authorities  under 
pressure  awarded  tardy  damages,  the  incident  remained  as  a 
warning  to  those  who  should  exercise  their  freedom.  By  the 
censorship  of  the  press  at  Constantinople,  and  the  arrest  and 
imprisonment  of  teachers  for  alleged  disloyalty,  mission  work 
was  continually  harassed.  Messrs.  Knapp  and  Raynolds, 
traveling  in  the  remoter  parts  of  Eastern  Turkey,  in  1884, 
were  attacked  and  without  redress,  though  the  United  States 
government  protested.  The  times  were  full  of  disorder  through- 
out the  interior.  Bands  of  Kurdish  robbers  were  sweeping 
down  upon  cities  and  villages,  often  acting  as  Hamidieh  or 
the  appointed  poUce  of  Sultan  Abdul  Hamid  II;  at  the  same 
time  the  coming  of  revolutionary  immigrants  from  south 
Russia  into  western  Turkey  spread  terror  through  the  region. 

Covert  attacks  of  Armenian  Roman  Catholics  upon  Prot- 
estant mission  work,  and  a  painful,  though  fortunately  tem- 
porary, violation  of  mission  comity  in  two  of  the  Board's 
stations  were  other  interferences  that  made  heavier  the  task. 

Distresses  of  still  another  sort  came  to  hinder  the  Armenian 
churches  in  the  assumption  of  full  care  of  work  for  their  people. 
The  specter  of  famine  stalked  over  wide  districts  of  the  empire, 
again  and  again,  during  the  '80s.  In  Eastern  Turkey,  in  1880, 
and  in  Central  Turkey,  in  1887-88,  the  failure  of  crops  was 
so  general  that  mission  work  was  of  necessity  turned  quite 
largely  to  famine  relief.  Gifts  from  America  and  Europe, 
amounting,  in  1888,  to  $31,000,  were  then  dispensed  by  the 
missionaries.  The  people  were  left  in  desperate  plight;  the 
tendency  to  emigration  increased;  self-support  was  for  a  time, 
at  least,  out  of  the  question;  the  wretchedness  of  the  Armenian 
people  was  almost  universal;  the  outlook  for  their  material 
welfare  seemed  hopeless. 


388  STORY   OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

Adversity  made  the  people  more  approachable  and  respon- 
sive. Here,  also,  famine  relief  worked  immeasurable  benefit 
Growth  to  the  mission,  as  it  impressed  not  only  the  evan- 
Notwith-  gelical  communities,  but  the  people  of  all  religions 
standing  and  races.  When  it  was  understood  that  help  was 
given  to  all  sects  alike  without  conditions  there  was  great 
astonishment.  Green-turbaned  Moslems  called  down  Heaven's 
richest  blessing  on  the  Protestants;  the  churches  were  filled 
with  new  Hsteners,  eager  to  hear  the  teachings  of  this  wonderful 
religion.  In  many  quarters  the  wall  of  prejudice  began  to  give 
way;  in  some  villages  the  Gregorian  churches  were  thrown 
open  to  missionaries  and  earnest  requests  came  for  evangelical 
preachers  and  teachers.  The  need  of  competent  men  for  such 
openings  was  desperate. 

Fresh  stimulus  came  to  the  schools  and  the  opportunity  of 
the  Bible  readers  was  extended.  Sixteen  Bible  women  in  the 
Harpoot  field,  with  over  500  scholars,  most  of  them  Gregorians, 
were  a  sign  of  the  times.  Revivals,  deep  and  strong,  blessed 
many  sections;  at  Aintab,  in  1888,  for  six  weeks  all  other  inter- 
ests were  forgotten.  Gregorians  helped  to  fill  the  churches; 
the  voice  of  prayer  could  be  heard  in  homes  as  one  walked 
by  them.  Hundreds  were  soon  added  to  the  city  churches, 
including  entire  families;  it  was  estimated  that  1000  were 
thus  won  to  Christ  in  the  Hmits  of  the  Central  Turkey 
Mission.  Many  Gregorians  were  reached,  though  without 
publicly  joining  the  Protestant  community.  Soon  the  same 
influence  was  felt  in  Eastern  and  Western  Turkey.  A  home 
missionary  society  was  formed  during  the  revival  at  Aintab, 
and  also  societies  for  strengthening  the  Christian  life  among 
young  people.  The  alienations,  so  disturbing  in  1883,  had 
now  entirely  subsided,  cooperation  between  missionaries  and 
native  workers  was  once  more  cordial  and  effective;  the  new 
loyalty  and  determination  that  the  gospel  should  win  its  way 
were  exhilarating. 

At  Constantinople  the  success  of  the  evangelical  work  in 


THE  NEARER  EAST  389 

Gedik  Pasha  was  prompting  a  similar  attempt  in  Haskeuy. 
The  Home  for  Girls  had  developed  into  the  American 
College  for  Girls,  and  with  a  corresponding  lift  in  its  require- 
ments. The  varied  activities  of  this  central  station  included 
influential  weekly  and  monthly  papers,  sent  all  over  the  empire, 
and  a  careful  evangelistic  work  for  Greeks.  The  Greek  Evan- 
gelical Alliance  indeed  had  its  center  then  at  Smyrna  and  its 
chief  field  of  labor  within  the  limits  of  that  station;  yet  it 
was  recognized  that  Constantinople  was  in  a  real  sense  the 
headquarters  for  this  as  for  all  the  missionary  work  in  the 
empire. 

The  educational  work  for  both  sexes  and  all  races  was  now 
of  central  importance  in  upbuilding  the  evangelical  faith.  In 
all  the  missions  the  system  of  schools  was  practically  com- 
plete, from  the  day  schools  in  the  several  outstations  to  the 
colleges  and  theological  seminaries.  And  there  was  no  more 
conscientious  class  of  helpers  than  the  hard-working  teachers 
of  the  village  schools  who  were  shedding  far  and  wide  the 
intellectual  and  spiritual  light  which  they  had  themselves 
found  in  the  higher  institutions  of  learning. 

In  the  European  section  of  the  Turkish  missions,  also,  the 
era  of  advance  liad  come.  The  first  fifteen  years  of  its  life 
Advance  ^^^  been  mainly  a  preparation.  The  war  period, 
in  Euro-  from  1875-78,  which  resulted  in  constituting  Bulgaria 
pean  an  autonomous  though  tributary  principality,  opened 

Turkey  g^  ^^^^  ^He  to  that  eager  nation  and  to  missionary 
work  for  it.  For  a  time  the  Board's  stations  were  under  three 
distinct  governments,  Bulgaria,  eastern  Roumelia,  and  Mace- 
donia. This  last  district,  whose  very  right  to  its  name  was  in 
constant  dispute  between  Turks  and  Greeks,  and  Albania,  just 
dawning  upon  the  missionary  horizon,  kept  the  missionaries  of 
those  regions  in  turmoil  and  sometimes  in  danger. 

During  the  decade  from  1877-87  the  missionary  advance 
among  the  Bulgarians  was  rapid,  judged  by  such  tokens  as 
increase  in  numbers,   contributions  of  native  Christians,   the 


390  STORY   OF  THE  AMERICAN   BOARD 

appearance  of  able  native  leaders,  and  the  development  of 
the  Bulgarian  Evangelical  Society.  Two  chief  obstacles  were 
national  jealousy,  which  prompted  the  Bulgarians  to  accept 
nothing  that  seemed  to  discredit  their  state  Church,  and  the 
tide  of  infidelity  and  irreligion  which  came  in  with  the  new 
political  freedom.  Yet  men  high  in  the  counsels  of  the  govern- 
ment admitted  their  indebtedness  to  the  mission  schools  and 
to  Robert  College.  When  a  new  church  edifice  was  dedicated 
in  Sofia,  the  capital  of  Bulgaria,  in  1888,  one  of  the  large  audience 
was  H.R.H.  Prince  Ferdinand,  who,  on  leaving,  presented  the 
church  with  500  francs  as  a  token  of  good-will,  an  incident 
in  marked  contrast  with  the  opposition  of  only  a  few  years 
before. 

Steady  work  in  the  mission  was  hindered  by  deadly  feuds 
between  the  races,  resulting  in  frequent  outbreaks  not  only  in 
the  mountains  of  Macedonia,  but  even  in  the  more  civiHzed 
cities  and  country  districts.  The  rebellion  of  1885,  which 
changed  eastern  Roumelia  to  southern  Bulgaria,  for  a  time 
interrupted  work  in  Philippopolis,  then  overrun  with  war. 
Pastors  and  teachers,  however,  remained  faithful  to  their 
posts  and  the  missionaries  were  alert  to  win  every  advantage. 
In  1896,  when  war  broke  out  between  Turks  and  Greeks, 
Salonica  and  Monastir  were  centers  of  activity,  and  missionary 
work  was  again  disturbed.  Undiscouraged  by  such  turbulent 
scenes  and  times,  efforts  were  promptly  renewed  to  develop  a 
generation  able  to  serve  the  cause  of  freedom  more  wisely. 
The  great  need  was  of  Christian  leadership  among  the  Bul- 
garians. Attention  was  turned  in  the  '90s  to  the  better 
equipment  of  the  Samokov  Institute,  and  of  the  schools  in 
general,  in  which  lay  so  largely  the  destiny  of  the  land.  The 
burden  occasioned  by  the  Board's  financial  distress  was  heavy; 
especial  cause  for  sorrow  and  shame  was  the  fact  that  the 
mission  paper,  Zornitza,  begun  in  1871  and  ever  since  a  mes- 
senger of  light  through  that  gloomy  land,  had  to  be  suspended 
for  lack  of  funds. 


THE  NEARER  EAST  391 

Meanwhile  on  the  Asiatic  side  of  the  Bosphorus  the  sky 
grew  darker.  The  horror  of  plague  once  more  befell.  Close 
upon  the  cholera  in  many  sections  came  famine;  in 
owenng  Eagj^em  Turkey,  in  1893-94,  famine  relief  again  had 
to  be  undertaken.  Serious  fires  added  to  the  bur- 
den; one  at  Marsovan  was  plainly  incendiary  and  apparently 
the  work  of  Turkish  officials.  While  in  European  Turkey 
civil  and  religious  liberty  were  gaining  ground,  in  Asia  oppres- 
sion and  persecution  were  strengthening. 

Marsovan  was  the  storm  center  in  the  Western  Turkey  Mis- 
sion. Anatolia  College  suffered  the  brunt  of  the  attack;  in  1893 
two  teachers  were  arrested  and  imprisoned  and  the  institution 
was  kept  in  close  watch  by  the  officials.  Even  families  and 
former  friends  looked  with  suspicion  on  each  other.  The 
Ottoman  government  seemed  determined  to  cripple  the  schools 
and  churches.  Legal  rights  were  openly  violated  in  spite  of 
missionary  and  diplomatic  remonstrances.  Through  all,  the 
steadfastness  of  the  missionaries,  their  prudence,  patience,  and 
devotion  were  worthy  of  full  praise.  At  length,  in  1895,  a 
firman  was  secured,  authorizing  the  rebuilding  of  the  girls' 
school  that  had  been  burned,  and  allowing  another  building 
for  Anatolia  College,  which  now  became  a  chartered  institution 
under  the  laws  of  Massachusetts,  with  an  trade  or  imperial 
charter  granted  in  Constantinople.  The  imprisoned  native 
teachers  were  released  on  condition  of  withdrawal  from  the 
empire.  Order  was  not  at  once  restored,  but  the  mission  felt 
that  its  course  had  been  justified.  In  the  midst  of  a  storm, 
such  as  they  had  never  encountered  before,  the  missionaries, 
as  one  of  them  said,  could  only  ''stand  in  the  teeth  of  the  gale 
and  outride  it  or  go  down." 

In  Central  Turkey,  too,  though  the  political  situation  was  far 
from  comfortable,  and  though  the  poverty  of  the  people  and 
the  weakness  of  the  government  were  depressing,  yet  the  mis- 
sionaries escaped  serious  embarrassment  and  were  able  to 
help  the  Christian  population  and  to  lead  them  even  in  such 


392  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

impoverished  times,  under  stress  of  necessity,  to  a  larger  measure 
of  self-support. 

In  Eastern  Turkey  the  situation  was  alarming.  Far  from 
the  centers  of  travel,  it  was  an  inviting  field  for  the  blow  both 
of  the  rebel  and  the  despot.  Van  was  a  hotbed  of  sedition. 
Erzroom  and  Bitlis,  brought  into  deplorable  condition  by 
famine,  were  now  subjected  to  such  oppression  and  terrorizing 
by  the  government  as  were  almost  unbearable.  Christians  were 
compelled  to  speak  in  enigmas  and  to  talk  in  whispers.  The 
missionaries,  restricted  somewhat  in  touring,  found  abundant 
need  and  opportunity  in  the  cities. 

A  conspicuous  event  of  the  year  1894  was  the  massacre  of 
Armenians  in  the  district  of  Sassoun.  To  this  lonely  and 
mountainous  region  in  the  Bitlis  field  soldiers  from  all  but 
one  of  the  cities  where  there  were  mission  stations  were  sent 
to  take  part  in  the  slaughter.  The  knowledge  and  terror  of 
this  act  traveled  fast  and  far.  Suspected  by  Turkish  officials 
and  Armenian  revolutionists,  the  missionaries  were  threatened 
by  both  parties.  Famine  and  cholera  and  the  general  terror 
following  the  massacres  taxed  the  resources  of  the  mission, 
especially  in  Bitlis.  Yet  new  doors  opened.  Officials  in  the 
old  Gregorian  Church  now  recognized  the  sincere  good-will  of 
the  American  missionaries  and  came  to  them  for  advice  and 
help. 

The  closing  months  of  1895  brought  to  the  missions  in 
Asiatic  Turkey  experiences  recalling  those  of  the  early  Chris- 
A  Carnival  tian  church  on  these  very  fields.  The  first  out- 
of  Blood  break  was  at  Constantinople  on  September  30, 
and  Fire  when  a  procession  of  Armenians  was  attacked  on 
their  way  to  the  Sublime  Porte  to  present  a  petition.  Panic 
ensued;  shops  were  closed;  the  alarm  spread.  Four  days 
later  similar  scenes  were  enacted  at  Ak  Hissar  and  without 
punishment.  In  less  than  a  week  Trebizond  was  filled  with 
bloodshed,  fire,  and  pillage.  Five  weeks  later  Sivas  was 
visited,   where   it   was   estimated   that   3300   Christians   were 


THE  NEARER  EAST  393 

slain,  5000  houses  looted,  200  burned,  and  over  2000  shops 
robbed.  Three  days  after,  at  noon,  the  blow  struck  Marsovan, 
and  within  three  hours  the  Armenian  community  had  been 
reduced  to  poverty,  the  markets  robbed  and  destroyed,  and 
hundreds  of  the  people  slain.  Here  the  mission  premises  were 
efficiently  protected,  but  three  of  the  outstations  suffered  more 
severely  than  the  city.  At  C^esarea,  where  assurances  of  safety 
had  been  received,  the  massacre  lasted  for  three  days.  Nico- 
media,  Broosa,  and  Smyrna  escaped  outbreak;  the  other  stations 
of  the  mission  shared  in  the  general  disturbance.  It  was 
clearly  an  organized  plot  to  wipe  out  the  Armenians;  the  orders 
came  from  the  capital  and  were  traceable  to  the  sultan's 
palace. 

At  once  relief  work  was  imperative.  The  mission  force  at 
Constantinople  became  a  distributing  agency  for  the  funds 
which  poured  in  from  Europe  and  America,  $500,000  being 
dispensed  by  them  besides  what  was  distributed  through  the 
Red  Cross  agency.  The  missionaries  in  the  interior  stations 
were  also  engrossed  in  rendering  relief. 

In  Central  Turkey  nearly  the  entire  field  of  the  mission  was 
involved  in  the  storm  of  murder  and  hate.  At  Oorfa  no  less 
than  6000  were  slaughtered  in  two  days,  beginning  December 
28,  nearly  half  the  number  being  burned  in  the  large  Gregorian 
church,  to  which  they  had  fled,  and  which  was  set  on  fire  after 
kerosene  had  been  sprinkled  on  people,  mattings,  and  whatever 
was  combustible.  At  Marash  the  mission  premises  were 
invaded,  the  theological  seminary  building  robbed  and  then 
burned,  and  two  students  fatally  wounded.  Six  places  in 
the  Aintab  field  were  visited;  out  of  a  population  of  43,000 
Armenians,  9500  were  slain.  For  weeks  afterward  the  mis- 
sion hospitals  were  crowded  with  the  wounded  and  dying. 
Zeitoon,  in  the  mountains,  was  the  only  point  where  there 
was  successful  armed  resistance.  Relief  work  in  this  mission, 
too,  was  absorbing. 

Eastern  Turkey  suffered  most  of  all.     Bitlis  was  attacked 


394  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

on  October  26  and  for  a  long  time  the  lives  of  the  missionaries 
there  were  in  jeopardy.  Erzroom  came  next.  Then  the  tide 
swept  across  the  Harpoot  plain,  engulfing  cities  and  villages 
in  its  path,  until  it  reached  Harpoot  November  11.  Here 
mission  premises  were  sacked,  and  all  but  four  of  the  buildings 
burned.  The  missionaries  themselves,  including  the  veteran 
Dr.  Wheeler,  who,  too  feeble  to  walk,  was  carried  by  the  little 
company  as  they  fled  from  their  burning  houses,  were  repeatedly 
fired  upon,  but  all  escaped  physical  injury.  Mardin,  attacked 
a  little  before  Harpoot,  successfully  repulsed  the  invaders. 
Van,  the  last  place  of  all  in  this  mission  to  suffer,  was  visited 
the  following  June,  when  the  Armenian  revolutionists  brought 
upon  themselves  the  consequences  of  the  disorders  they  had 
provoked. 

The  glory  of  these  terrible  weeks  was  the  Christian  loyalty, 
both  of  the  missionaries  and  the  Armenians.  The  test  of 
martyrdom  was  unflinchingly  faced  by  multitudes  of  men  and 
women,  young  and  old,  who  firmly  refused  to  recant.  The 
pastors  set  a  noble  example,  as  in  Sivas,  where  one  was  caught 
in  the  market  when  the  massacre  began,  and  for  four  hours 
was  imprisoned  with  his  people,  awaiting  death.  ''When  the 
soldiers  found  them,  at  a  later  hour,  they  instantly  called 
upon  the  pastor  to  accept  Islam.  He  refused,  and  they  struck 
him;  when  he  still  refused  upon  a  second  demand,  they  smote 
him  again.  Then,  when  for  the  third  time  they  offered  him 
his  life  if  he  would  deny  his  faith,  he  replied,  like  Polycarp 
of  old,  '  I  not  only  believe  the  Christian  faith,  but  I  have  taught 
it  to  others;  I  cannot  deny  it.  If  for  this  you  wish  to  kill  me, 
I  am  ready.'  And  with  this  word  he  fell,  pierced  by  the  rifle 
balls  of  his  foes."  The  missionaries  were  impressed  also  with 
the  loyalty  of  the  Armenians  in  the  Gregorian  Church,  and 
felt  that  there  must  be  something  real  to  them  in  the  Chris- 
tianity to  which  they  thus  clung  even  at  the  cost  of  their  lives. 

Not  a  missionary  forsook  his  post  or  wavered  at  it.  One 
figure,   that   of   Miss   Corinna   Shattuck,   may   stand   for   all. 


THE  NEARER  EAST  395 

Alone  in  charge  of  the  station  at  Oorfa,  and  disdaining  to 
use  a  permit  to  leave  for  Aintab,  which  was  granted  her  just 
before  the  bloody  work  began,  this  frail  woman  remained  as 
a  tower  of  defense  to  her  distracted  people.  The  special 
guards  assigned  to  protect  her  house  obeyed  her  as  if  she  were 
a  queen,  and  fought  back  the  mob  through  a  frightful  Saturday 
and  Sunday,  while  the  officials  sent  repeated  assurances  that 
no  harm  should  come  to  her.  Meanwhile  her  neighbors 
swarmed  in,  over  walls  and  past  guards,  for  protection,  until 
on  Saturday  night  240  people,  sixty  of  them  men,  crowded  every 
room  and  corner,  asking  only  to  remain  under  her  shelter. 
Realizing  her  inability  to  protect  the  men,  the  next  morning 
she  despatched  them  secretly  with  a  day's  rations  to  a  hiding- 
place,  where  she  locked  them  in,  herself  keeping  the  key. 
When  in  the  afternoon  Moslem  officials  inspected  her  premises, 
asking  Miss  Shattuck  to  appear  on  the  veranda,  begging  her, 
^\^th  salaams,  not  to  be  disturbed,  and  inquiring  if  there  were 
any  men  there,  she  was  able  to  say  honestly,  ''No,  only  women 
and  children."     So  she  saved  all  who  had  fled  to  her  for  refuge. 

In  the  days  of  panic  and  distress  that  followed  the  slaughter 
at  Oorfa,  when  all  the  leading  Armenians  were  either  killed, 
imprisoned,  or  disabled,  the  burden  of  caring  for  the  wounded 
and  the  refugees  was  calmly  undertaken  by  Miss  Shattuck, 
who  forgot  that  she  was  really  an  invalid  in  doing  the  work 
of  a  strong  and  fearless  man.  A  Gregorian,  speaking  of  those 
days,  said,  ''If  it  had  not  been  for  Miss  Shattuck,  we  could 
not  have  endured  the  pressure.  We  should  all  have  turned 
Moslem." 

The  missionaries  at  once  attacked  their  problem  of  recon- 
struction. Food  to  sustain  life  was  first  of  all  to  be  provided. 
Within  a  few  days  after  the  massacre  there  were 

The 

„  no  less  than  2000  refugees  in  Trebizond  alone,  beg- 

Recovery         .         »       ,         ,_,,.. 

gmg   for   bread.     The   mission    compound   m    Van 

became  an  asylum  for  15,000  refugees;  some  relief  was  given 

to  at  least  30,000  in  the  region  about  Marash.     After  the 


396  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

distribution  of  bread,  the  providing  of  clothing  was  in  order, 
then  the  getting  of  tools  and  household  utensils  with  which 
to  begin  life  again.  The  rebuilding  was  in  itself  a  huge  under- 
taking. A  multitude  of  homes  had  been  destroyed  by  fire; 
villages  were  practically  wiped  out,  and  many  large  cities 
laid  waste.  Some  of  the  finest  churches  in  the  Harpoot  field 
had  been  burned;  all  but  four  of  the  mission  buildings  had 
gone  up  in  smoke.  Industries,  too,  had  to  be  devised  or  renewed 
and  special  provision  made  for  the  thousands  of  widows  and 
orphans.  There  were  250  widows  and  800  orphans  at  the  one 
station  of  Marsovan;  other  centers,  hke  Oorfa,  Harpoot,  and 
Marash,  had  twice  as  many. 

To  make  the  situation  still  harder,  the  financial  condition 
of  the  Board  prevented  it  from  rendering  direct  aid  and  even 
compelled  further  retrenchment;  it  seemed  to  the  burdened 
missionaries  sometimes  as  if  the  American  churches  would 
complete  the  extermination  which  the  cruel  Turk  had  begun. 
But  other  avenues  of  help  were  mercifully  opened.  The 
American  Red  Cross  society  rendered  splendid  and  prolonged 
service;  likewise  the  Armenian  Relief  Committee  of  America, 
organized  largely  through  the  efforts  of  Rev.  Frederick  D.  Greene, 
whose  book  on  the  Armenian  massacres  had  set  the  shocking 
facts  before  the  world.  Representatives  of  the  Mennonite 
Church  of  America  and  of  German  friends  of  missions  came 
on  errands  of  relief,  which  proved  to  be  beginnings  of  per- 
manent service,  as  the  former  undertook  the  care  of  an  orphan- 
age at  Hadjin,  and  the  latter  opened  similar  institutions  at 
several  centers  where  the  overtaxed  missionaries  were  glad  to 
turn  work  into  their  hands.  An  orphanage  was  opened  at 
Sivas  by  the  Swiss.  Large  sums  were  at  length  forwarded 
to  the  missionaries  for  relief,  most  of  which  was  administered 
by  giving  employment  to  the  needy.  More  than  $400,000 
was  distributed  in  this  way  in  the  Eastern  Turkey  Mission 
alone.  Prominent  assistants  in  the  relief  work  were  Professor 
and  Mrs.  J.  Rendel  Harris,  of  Cambridge,  England,  who  came 


THE  NEARER  EAST  397 

as  representatives  of  the  Society  of  Friends  and  remained 
for  some  time  to  give  the  cheer  of  their  presence  and  help  in 
many  of  the  mission  stations;  also  Mr.  Leopold  Favre,  of 
Geneva,  and  Lady  Anderson,  of  Dublin,  though  the  latter 
did  not  visit  the  country. 

A  pathetic  figure  everywhere  in  the  desolated  land  was  the 
orphan  child,  homeless  and  helpless.  The  missionaries  were 
A  New  fairly  compelled  to  undertake  the  care  of  these 
Depart-  little  ones,  whose  numbers  were  appalling.  Soon 
°^®°*  at  each  of  the  mission  stations,  as  in  many  of  the 

larger  towns,  orphan  homes  were  opened.  About  2000  children 
were  thus  provided  for  in  the  Eastern  Turkey  Mission  alone; 
1000  at  Harpoot.  Similar  orphanages  were  instituted  in 
many  places  in  Central  Turkey  also,  such  as  Oorfa,  Aintab, 
Marash,  and  Hadjin.  The  American  Armenian  Relief  Com- 
mittee, well  organized,  with  Miss  Emily  C.  Wheeler,  daughter 
of  Dr.  Wheeler,  of  Harpoot,  and  herself  long  a  missionary 
there,  as  its  secretary,  now  definitely  undertook  the  contin- 
ued support  of  many  of  these  orphanages,  later  broadening  its 
field  to  render  similar  service  to  orphans  in  India. 

The  expense  of  these  orphanages  was  kept  down  by  the 
provision  of  some  forms  of  work,  through  which  the  children 
could  earn  a  part  of  their  own  support.  At  Oorfa,  in  1897, 
sixty-five  girls  were  employed  in  stocking  making,  thirty  in 
felt  embroidery,  300  in  spinning  and  weaving,  and  200  in 
silk  needlework.  This  experiment  with  industrial  work  as  a 
feature  of  self-help  was  so  successful  that  it  was  introduced 
into  many  of  the  high  schools  and  colleges  of  the  land. 

The  events  of  the  next  decade  show  how  providential  was 
the  commitment  of  these  thousands  of  orphans  during  their  im- 
pressionable and  formative  years  to  the  sole  care  of  Chris- 
tian missionaries.  Thus  a  great  company  of  young  men  and 
women  were  made  ready  for  the  new  day  soon  to  dawn. 

More  than  five  years  passed  before  the  Board's  claim  of 
indemnity,  amounting  to  about  $100,000,  was  granted.     At 


398  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

last,  in  1901,  the  money  was  paid  over  to  the  United  States  gov- 
ernment to  be  distributed  to  the  several  claimants.  Stations 
Hke  Harpoot  and  Marash  were  thus  supplied  with 
^L^^'*^  funds  for  rebuilding.  But  the  attitude  of  the  Turk- 
ish government  was  not  humble  or  apologetic  at 
the  time  of  the  massacres;  it  rather  uttered  absurd  charges  of 
sedition  against  some  of  the  missionaries,  notably  Rev.  George 
P.  Knapp  and  Dr.  H.  N.  Barnum.  Open  threats  were  made 
against  the  lives  of  others.  Mr.  Knapp  was  taken  under 
arrest  from  Biths  to  Alexandretta  and  bundled  out  of  the 
country  with  ''expelled"  written  across  his  passport. 

During  these  times  new  respect  and  affection  for  the  mis- 
sionaries were  born  in  the  hearts  of  Armenians.  Desolate 
Revival  ^^^  humbled  in  spirit,  they  were  ready  now  to 
and  listen  with  eagerness  to  the  gospel  of  a  redeeming 

Encourage-  Christ.  Practically  revival  conditions  began  to  be 
ment  recognized   in   many  centers,   as  in  Aintab,  where 

the  entire  Armenian  community  insisted  on  evangehcal  teach- 
ing throughout  the  year  1897.  Out  of  their  bitter  poverty 
the  evangelical  Armenians  still  contributed  generously  for  the 
support  of  their  churches.  Small  communities,  hterally  in 
rags,  loyally  began  to  raise  funds  to  maintain  preaching  ser- 
vices, promising  soon  to  come  to  self-support.  In  1898  four 
of  these  stricken  churches  in  outstations,  whose  names  would 
be  unrecognized  in  America,  became  self-supporting,  and  the 
amount  of  native  contributions  in  that  field  was  $3400  against 
grants  of  $1700  by  the  Board. 

The  Gregorians  were  also  brought  into  closer  relationship 
with  their  evangelical  brethren  and  with  the  missionaries,  to 
whom  the  Armenian  patriarch  at  Constantinople  showed  an 
unusual  friendliness.  Gregorians  and  Evangelicals  for  a  time 
united  in  services  and  a  new  spirit  animated  many  of  the 
Gregorian  clergy,  so  that  interchange  of  visits  from  one  church 
to  the  other  were  not  uncommon. 

As  peace  was  restored  and  life  took  somewhat  its  usual 


THE  NEARER    EAST  399 

course  again,  this  tendency  of  the  Gregorians  to  unite  with 
the  Protestants  naturally  diminished,  but  the  happy  relations 
then  established  were  never  to  be  altogether  broken.  In 
Central  Turkey  the  evangelizing  of  the  ancient  Church  and  its 
people  was  most  marked;  in  many  sections  the  closer  inter- 
course has  been  maintained  and  the  worship  and  sermon  in 
the  Gregorian  Church  have  been  so  changed  as  to  become  sub- 
stantially evangelical.  So  marked  became  this  new  temper  in 
Aintab  and  vicinity  that  it  called  forth  at  length  a  rebuking 
decree  from  the  patriarch  at  Constantinople;  yet  the  ten- 
dency is  several-fold  stronger  now  than  then. 

Another  ominous  outbreak  occurred  in  Constantinople  in 
1896,  in  which  at  least  5000  Armenians  were  slaughtered;  but 
outwardly,  at  least,  peace  was  soon  restored. 

With  the  turn  into  the  twentieth  century,  the  missions  in 
Turkey  were  again  outreaching.  The  emphasis  of  missionary 
labor  was  now  put  upon  education ;  evangelistic 
f  Ad  effort  was  being  committed  to  the  native  leaders. 

In  Central  Turkey  a  home  missionary  society  was 
organized,  under  the  auspices  of  the  Cilicia  Union,  to  bring 
the  churches  of  that  body  to  self-support  and  to  eke  out  the 
inadequate  appropriations  for  the  native  agency.  In  Eastern 
Turkey  there  was  so  serious  a  drain  upon  native  workers 
through  emigration  that  the  force  was  altogether  inadequate 
to  the  need.  The  struggle  for  permission  to  rebuild  Euphrates 
College,'  the  delaying  of  the  indemnity,  and  the  terror  still 
resting  on  the  people  made  it  harder  here  to  push  reconstruc- 
tion. In  this  mission,  therefore,  the  work  of  touring  was 
maintained  with  all  possible  vigor  for  the  supervision  and 
heartening  of  the  depressed  communities,  Mr.  Browne,  of 
Harpoot,  spending  thirty-two  weeks  of  the  year  1900  in  such 
traveling  among  the  churches. 

In  Western  Turkey  the  high  schools  were  crowded  with 
earnest  students,  and  the  most  hopeful  field  for  evangelical 
effort  was  found  to  be  in  the  colleges  and   boarding-schools. 


400  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

By  this  time  the  older  pupils  in  the  orphanages  were  being 
sent  forth  into  permanent  homes  or  to  the  higher  schools, 
and  the  value  of  these  institutions  was  proved.  The  mission- 
aries doubted  if  any  other  form  of  labor  had  yielded  so  large 
a  return. 

Van,  the  old  capital  of  Armenia,  now  showed  a  lessening 
opposition  of  ecclesiastics  and  made  the  most  substantial 
progress  of  all  the  stations  in  Eastern  Turkey  in  the  decade 
following  the  massacres. 

While  the  Board's  missions  in  Asiatic  Turkey  were  thus 
ravaged,  the  fields  in  European  Turkey  were  not  without 
The  Bal-  disturbance.  The  Graeco-Turkish  war,  in  1897, 
kans  Again  brought  to  the  clash  the  unrest  and  disorder  which 
Aflame  had  been  secretly  fomented.  The  three  stations 
under  Turkish  rule  suffered  all  the  hardships  of  riot,  massacre, 
and  war.  Salonica,  opened  as  a  station  only  two  years  before, 
became  an  important  military  post  on  the  Turkish  side,  while 
Monastir  occupied  an  uncertain  position  between  the  contend- 
ing forces.  Yet  missionaries  remained  at  their  stations  and 
none  of  them  were  disturbed.  Mr.  Haskell  and  Dr.  House 
were  able  to  spend  at  least  from  two  to  three  months  of  the 
year  in  touring;  native  evangelists  kept  at  their  tasks  and  the 
colporters  visited  at  least  120  towns  and  villages.  The  diffu- 
sion of  religious  literature  proved  an  important  department 
in  this  mission,  as  in  their  unrest  of  mind,  eagerness  for  liberty, 
and  comparative  seclusion  of  life  these  rough  mountain  people 
were  especially  attracted  to  the  printed  word.  The  publica- 
tion department  was  at  this  time,  1898,  transferred  from 
Constantinople  to  Samokov,  with  the  coming  of  Mr.  and 
Mrs.  Thomson,  as  it  was  felt  that  such  work  should  be  done 
on  Bulgarian  soil.  The  Zornitza,  regretfully  suspended  in 
1897  for  lack  of  funds,  the  mission  now  felt  compelled  to 
resume,  even  on  an  unstable  financial  basis,  so  necessary  was 
it  to  the  work. 

The  removal  of  the  publication  department  to  Samokov 


THE  NEARER  EAST  401 

left  Elias  Riggs  the  sole  representative  of  this  mission  at  Con- 
stantinople, to  give  his  remaining  years  to  the  revision  of  the 
Bulgarian  Bible  Dictionary  and  other  editorial  work.  At 
length,  in  1901,  after  sixty-seven  years  of  service  and  with 
but  one  furlough  in  America,  his  life  work  was  completed, 
unmatched,  it  is  believed,  among  all  missionary  societies  of 
the  world,  both  for  the  length  of  consecutive  service  and  for 
the  marvelous  Hterary  abihty  it  displayed.  "He  had  a  respect- 
able knowledge  of  something  like  twenty  languages,  and  a 
scholarly  knowledge  of  twelve.  He  took  a  most  important 
part  in  the  preparation  of  three  influential  versions  of  the 
Holy  Scriptures;  viz.,  Armenian,  Bulgarian,  and  Turkish.  He 
was  also  the  sweet  singer  for  the  evangelical  communities  of 
at  least  three  nationalities,  the  Bulgarian,  Armenian,  and 
Greek.  The  number  of  hymns  which  he  translated  or  wrote 
in  the  Bulgarian  language  reached  the  remarkable  number  of 
478."  With  all  his  abilities  and  attainments  Dr.  Riggs  was 
distinguished  among  his  missionary  associates  for  his  humility 
and  saintly  Christian  character. 

While  the  missionaries  were  pursuing  their  quiet  but  vigorous 
tasks  of  spreading  the  evangel  over  these  turbulent  lands  and 
training  in  church  and  school  the  little  companies 
Miss  Stone  ^^^  ventured  to  defy  the  prejudice  and  superstition 
of  their  fellows,  an  event  happened  which  brought 
them  for  a  time  into  conspicuous  notice.  In  the  mountains  of 
Macedonia,  near  the  Bulgarian  border,  on  September  3,  1901, 
a  brigand  band  fell  upon  a  group  of  Christian  workers  and 
carried  off  for  ransom  Miss  Ellen  M.  Stone  and  Madam  Tsilka, 
the  wife  of  a  Bulgarian  preacher.  The  sum  first  demanded 
was  $110,000,  which  was  finally  reduced  to  $68,200,  upon 
payment  of  which  the  captives,  after  172  days  of  hardship 
and  anxiety  beyond  words  to  describe,  were  set  free  on  Feb- 
ruary 23,  1902. 

Immediately  upon  the  capture,  the  entire  mission  force  set 
itself  to  discover  the  whereabouts  of  the  prisoners  and  to  effect 


402  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

their  release.  The  United  States  government  came  to  their 
aid.  Negotiations  with  the  brigands,  who,  it  soon  came  to 
be  suspected  and  afterward  to  be  known,  were  not  mere  robbers, 
but  revolutionary  leaders,  were  prolonged,  difficult,  and  even 
hazardous.  At  length  the  way  was  opened  for  passing  over 
the  ransom,  contributed  in  part  by  Miss  Stone's  family  and 
friends  and  in  part  by  churches  and  individuals  in  response  to 
appeal.  It  was  due  to  the  courage  and  skill  of  Dr.  House,  Mr. 
Peet,  and  Mr.  Garguilo,  chief  dragoman  of  the  United  States 
Legation,  that  the  actual  transfer  of  the  money  was  safely 
and  secretly  effected;  thereupon  they  waited  in  agonizing 
suspense  for  the  brigands  to  fulfil  their  part  of  the  bargain. 
This  was  so  circuitously  done  that  several  days,  perhaps  even 
a  week  or  more,  elapsed  before  Miss  Stone  and  Mrs.  Tsilka, 
with  the  baby  Elencha,  born  during  the  captivity,  were  left 
under  cover  of  the  night  three  miles  outside  the  city  of  Strum- 
nitza,  into  which  they  were  brought  early  on  a  Sunday  morn- 
ing, to  be  welcomed  and  cared  for  by  friends. 

Race  hatreds  and  the  spirit  of  political  rebellion  grew  fiercer. 
The  Russian  consul  was  shot  at  Monastir,  the  center  of  revo- 
lutionary disorder,  and  though  the  missionaries 
p.  . ,  suffered  no  personal  violence,  the  mission,  like  all 

else  in  the  land,  seemed  to  be  resting  on  the  crater 
of  a  volcano.  The  possibility  of  touring  in  Macedonia  was 
greatly  reduced.  Organized  bands  patrolled  the  country,  and 
wherever  the  missionaries  went  they  saw  the  signs  of  murder 
and  heard  the  stories  of  feuds  between  Greek  and  Turk  and 
Bulgarian.  In  response  to  calls  for  relief  for  those  who  had 
been  left  without  home,  food,  or  clothing,  funds  for  that  pur- 
pose were  forwarded  from  this  country  through  the  generous 
leadership  of  the  Christian  Herald  and  distributed  by  the 
missionaries.  At  Salonica  and  Monastir  much  time  was  given 
to  the  distribution  of  this  relief. 

Notwithstanding  all  the  confusion  and  distraction  of  mind 
which   such   scenes   involved,   the  work    of   the  mission  was 


THE  NEARER  EAST  403 

maintained  and  in  some  ways  strengthened  during  these  years. 
Especially  in  the  lines  of  education  and  publication  the  field 
was  open.  The  institutions  at  Samokov  increased  their  equip- 
ment and  multiplied  their  efficiency.  New  educational  under- 
takings, like  Miss  Clark's  famous  kindergarten  at  Sofia,  and 
the  Agricultural  and  Theological  Institute  founded  by  Dr. 
House  at  Salonica,  the  latter  soon  to  be  developed  into  an 
independent  institution,  with  its  board  of  American  trustees 
and  supporters,  widened  the  service  of  the  mission  to  the  youth 
of  all  races.  Churches  grew  stronger  in  outward  as  in  inner 
life.  The  church  at  Philippopolis  in  1900  erected  a  substan- 
tial and  attractive  stone  edifice,  sjrmbol  of  the  influence  which 
it  was  coming  to  exert  in  the  city.  The  call  for  better  trained 
preachers  and  teachers  was  everywhere  being  heard. 

The  Albanians,  who  had  been  reached  somewhat  by  col- 
porters  going  out  from  Monastir,  now  had  an  organized  church 
at  Kortcha,  with  a  native  pastor,  Mr.  Sinas,  who  had  trans- 
lated the  Scriptures  into  the  Albanian  language.  The  eager- 
ness of  many  of  the  leaders  of  the  race  to  secure  missionaries, 
though  rather  a  patriotic  than  a  religious  aspiration,  was 
significant.  An  Albanian  hey  went  so  far  as  to  offer,  in  1899, 
the  free  use  of  a  room  in  his  house  for  a  school  if  the  mission 
would  furnish  a  Christian  teacher.  Thence  came  the  only 
school  for  girls  in  the  country  in  which  the  vernacular  was 
used,  and  the  sole  missionary  school  for  Albanian  boys  was 
also  planted  in  Kortcha.  The  girls'  boarding-school,  con- 
ducted by  Miss  Kyrias,  herself  an  Albanian  and  a  graduate  of 
the  American  College  for  Girls  at  Constantinople,  at  once 
made  a  place  for  itself,  with  five  boarders  the  first  year,  and 
all  its  teachers  Albanians. 

Still  injustice  and  oppression  bore  down  on  the  wretched 
An  Empire  peoples  of  Turkey  until  there  was  no  basis  either 
of  Misery  of  peace  or  prosperity  upon  which  to  build.  The 
exodus  to  America  was  constant,  and  from  the  Balkan  coun- 
try as  well  as  from  Eastern  Turkey.     Taxes  became  heavier 


404  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

and  government  troops  forced  them  from  the  people  till  they 
were  stripped  of  their  small  possessions;  when  there  was  no 
longer  money  to  be  got  from  them,  their  household  and  farm 
utensils  were  taken  and  even  bedding  and  necessary  furni- 
ture. Fear  of  the  Turk  was  universal,  and  no  Armenian 
dared  tell  his  troubles  save  in  deepest  secrecy  to  some  trusted 
missionary. 

Again  the  influence  of  the  missionaries  increased  amid  the 
general  misery.  Their  grit  and  devotion  called  forth  the 
admiration  even  of  those  who  had  little  interest  in  their  work. 
Many  thought  they  would  withdraw  after  the  massacres  of 
1895  and  were  correspondingly  impressed  by  their  staying. 
Two  Turks,  discussing  the  advisability  of  burning  certain 
mission  premises  in  Eastern  Turkey,  were  overheard  to  say: 
''Burn  every  building  they  possess  and  they  will  not  leave 
the  country.     They  are  here  to  stay." 

There  could  now  be  reported  370  common  schools  in  the 
empire,  forty-four  high  schools,  eight  colleges,  one  normal 
The  Edu-  school,  and  five  divinity  schools,  with  over  21,000 
cational  studying  in  all  these  institutions.  In  Western 
Advance  Turkey  the  Bithynia  High  School,  which  a  few 
years  before  had  erected  large  and  supposedly  ample  buildings, 
was  now  planning  for  another.  Anatolia  College  at  Marsovan 
was  filled  to  overflowing;  its  tuition  fees  had  grown  from  $3000 
in  1897  to  $13,000  in  1907.  And  the  growth  of  the  college 
was  as  marked  in  influence  as  in  numbers.  Within  the  same 
period  twenty  per  cent  of  the  graduates  had  become  preachers 
and  thirty -three  per  cent  teachers.  Euphrates  College  at 
Harpoot,  the  only  institution  of  its  grade  for  more  than 
3,000,000  people,  was  a  veritable  hghthouse  amid  dark  and 
stormy  waters.  The  International  College  at  Smyrna  was 
formally  organized  in  1901-02.  St.  Paul's  Institute,  transferred 
in  1904  from  independent  control  to  the  care  of  the  Board, 
became  one  of  its  higher  institutions. 

Most  of  the  educational  work  so  far  was  perforce  for  the 


THE  NEARER   EAST  405 

Armenians,  though  a  few  Syrians  and  Jacobites  were  in  the 
schools.  At  Mardin,  in  Eastern  Turkey,  however,  where  Ara- 
A  Broad-  bic  was  the  common  language,  there  were  few 
ening  Con-  Armenians.  A  considerable  leaven  of  other  races  now 
stituency  brought  great  joy  to  the  missionaries,  who  felt 
that  the  work  of  the  past  was  proving  itself  in  the  winning 
of  confidence  and  attention  from  those  who  so  far  had  held 
aloof.  At  Smyrna  the  missionaries  were  giving  increasing 
attention  to  the  Greeks.  At  Constantinople,  during  1903, 
five  services  were  maintained  every  Sunday  in  different  parts 
of  the  city  for  Armenians  and  three  for  Greek  Evangelicals, 
with  one  service  in  Turkish.  The  evangelical  Greeks  of 
Salonica  had  shown  a  desire  to  come  under  the  European 
Turkey  Mission,  though  no  funds  were  available  to  aid  in  so 
important  a  venture.  The  association  of  Gregorians  with  the 
Evangehcals  became  still  more  marked  in  many  places,  espe- 
cially in  Central  Turkey.  Children  of  Gregorians  and  Greeks 
were  sitting  side  by  side  in  the  schools  at  most  of  the  stations, 
and  different  races  mingled  in  the  colleges. 

Sweeping  revivals  of  religion  appeared  at  several  centers  of 
this  mission,  one  at  Oorfa  being  the  first  in  its  history,  and 
marked  a  new  starting-point  in  church  hfe.  The  effect  of  these 
revivals,  as  indeed  the  strength  of  all  mission  w^ork  now,  was 
not  to  be  measured  by  the  number  of  converts  or  the  mere 
size  of  the  evangelical  communities.  For  results  were  felt  in 
the  Gregorian  Church  as  markedly  as  in  the  Evangehcal.  In 
the  college  at  Aintab,  for  example,  where,  in  1903,  every 
member  of  the  senior  class  confessed  Christ,  there  were 
many  Gregorians  among  the  converts  and  the  line  between 
them  and  the  Evangelicals  was  in  the  college  circle  scarcely 
regarded. 

The  work  of  these  missions,  so  fast  outgrowing  the  supply 
of  men  and  money  which  the  Board  could  provide,  was  now 
helped  by  the  bringing  to  it  of  other  resources.  The  medical 
department  was  often  able  to  maintain  itself  or  to  elicit  gifts 


406  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

from  new  quarters.  At  Mardin  the  receipts  from  patients 
covered  the  expense,  not  only  of  the  dispensary,  but  of  the 
hospital.  A  new  hospital  at  Van  was  secured  by 
jj,  "  the  income  from  private  practise.  Of  seventeen 
stations  in  Turkey,  nine  had  missionary  physicians 
in  1906,  with  well-constructed  hospitals  planned  or  already 
provided.  Loyal  Armenians,  particularly  some  who  had  pros- 
pered in  America,  rendered  generous  aid.  One  donated  a 
hospital  to  Diarbekir;  another  gave  a  gymnasium  to  Euphrates 
College  as  well  as  a  school  building  in  Arabkir  for  Armenian 
girls.  Many  of  these  Armenians  were  debarred  from  return- 
ing personally  to  help  their  own  people;  indeed,  the  exodus 
to  America  continued;  in  a  single  day  of  1907  forty  persons 
left  Harpoot  for  the  United  States. 

As  a  result  of  interest  roused  in  Germany  by  the  relief  work 
of  its  representatives  after  the  massacres,  a  carefully  drawn 
agreement  was  made  in  1906,  by  which  the  Deutsche  Hiilfs- 
bund  began  to  cooperate  with  the  Board  in  evangelistic 
and  medical  work  in  some  parts  of  Eastern  and  Central 
Turkey. 

In  1906  the  Turkish  government  at  last  made  important 
concessions  affecting  the  property  rights  of  American  citizens 
Political  in  the  land.  The  "most  favored  nation"  clause  of 
Rights  the  treaties  was  now  made  operative  for  the  United 

Gained  States;  under  pressure  the  same  privileges  were 
secured  for  American  citizens  and  institutions  in  Turkey  as 
had  been  granted  to  those  of  the  other  great  powers,  and  to 
the  immense  relief  and  encouragement  of  the  missionaries. 
It  was  now  possible  to  erect  and  own  buildings  and  to  escape 
a  multitude  of  petty  annoyances,  not  only  from  local  officials, 
but  from  those  higher  in  office,  in  the  developing  of  mission 
plants  and  enterprises.  The  new  conditions  were  affirmed 
in  an  irade  from  the  sultan,  ordering  the  execution  of  the 
decision  in  detail  in  all  American  establishments  and  insti- 
tutions. 


GLIMPSES  OF  MEDICAL  ESTABLISHMENTS  IN  TURKEY 


HOSPITAL    AT    AINTAB 

IN    THE    babies'    WARD,  AINTAB 

DISPENSARY  PATIENTS  AT  TALAS 


4  HOSPITAL  AND  OUT-PATIENTS,  SIVAS 

5  IN  THE  OPERATING  ROOM,  HARPOOT 

6  NATIVE    NURSES   AT   MARSOVAN 


THE  NEARER   EAST  407 

Then  came  an  immeasurably  greater  blessing.  On  July  24, 
1908,  the  sultan  suddenly  announced  the  restoration  of  the 
The  Swift  constitution  of  1876,  which  meant  full  civil  and 
and  Silent  religious  liberty  and  parliamentary  government. 
Revolution  At  first  the  people  were  stunned;  when  they  began 
to  shout  the  new  words  of  liberty  they  hardly  knew  how  to 
frame  them  or  what  they  meant.  But  every  quarter  of  the 
empire,  European  and  Asiatic,  broke  forth  into  celebrations; 
in  streets  and  squares,  in  mosques  and  churches,  with  addresses 
by  Mohammedan  and  Christian  speakers  to  audiences  of  all 
races.  It  seemed  as  if  the  people  might  become  delirious  with 
joy.  Even  one  of  the  older  missionaries  wrote,  ''If  I  had 
boarded  a  comet  and  were  riding  on  the  cowcatcher  around  the 
periphery  of  the  solar  system,  I  could  hardly  be  in  more  of  a 
whirl  than  I  am  with  the  rush  of  events." 

Though  so  sudden  and  amazing  to  multitudes,  by  some  the 
event  had  been  long  anticipated.  The  Young  Turk  party 
had  been  for  years  patiently  laying  plans;  by  the  compulsion 
of  its  leaders,  officers  of  the  imperial  army  who  had  the  Balkan 
soldiery  behind  them,  the  sultan  was  forced  to  make  and  then 
to  carry  out  his  new  decree.  But  long  before  the  parliament 
convened  in  November  the  nation  enjoyed  the  fruits  of  the 
new  era.  The  awful  sense  of  repression  and  fear  was  gone. 
Censorship  was  removed  from  the  press,  which  single  fact 
transformed  Turkey  into  a  new  land  where  free  speech  was 
possible.  Barriers  between  races  and  religions  were  for  a 
time  entirely  broken  over.  Masses  were  celebrated  in  Arme- 
nian churches  for  Mohammedans  who  had  fallen  in  the  cause 
of  liberty,  while  honors  were  paid  by  Moslems  to  Armenian 
dead  as  martyrs  dying  for  their  country.  Bands  of  revolu- 
tionaries came  in  from  their  fastnesses  to  swell  the  joyous 
crowds  in  the  streets  and  cafes  of  the  cities;  political  pris- 
oners were  released  from  bondage.  Compulsory  education 
was  now  enjoined,  if  not  at  once  enforced;  courts  were  re- 
quired to  become  impartial  tribunals;  a  fair  system  of  taxes 


408  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

was  promised.  The  wondering  nation  looked  on  with  new  eyes 
of  hope. 

To  say  that  this  revolution  was  altogether  the  result  of 
missionary  effort  would  be  absurd;  to  leave  out  the  mission's 
The  part  in  it  would  be  as  unwarranted.     Enver  Bey, 

Mission's  foremost  in  the  Young  Turk  party,  in  the  course 
P^rt  of  a  conversation  with  Mr.  MacLachlan  at  Smyrna, 

warmly  commended  the  service  of  Americans  and  American 
institutions  to  Turkey,  and  declared  that  they  had  encouraged 
and  inspired  his  associates  and  himself  in  undertaking  the 
movement  for  reform.  Turkish  officials  congratulated  the 
Armenians  upon  their  greater  ability  to  understand  and  appro- 
priate the  blessings  of  a  free  constitutional  government  because 
of  what  they  had  learned  from  the  missionaries. 

And  this  was  as  true  on  one  side  of  the  Bosphorus  as  the 
other.  When  the  jubilee  of  evangelical  work  in  European 
Turkey  was  celebrated  in  Sofia  in  August,  1908,  the  review 
of  the  history  showed  unmistakably  that  the  influence  of  the 
mission  on  the  development  of  the  Bulgarian  people  had  been 
strong  and  formative.  Careful  as  were  the  missionaries  not 
to  abet  their  pupils  in  revolutionary  acts,  they  could  not  but 
sympathize  with  the  Bulgarians  in  their  struggle  against  the 
Greek  hierarchy.  By  reviving  and  uplifting  the  national 
literature,  and  by  scattering  the  Bible  and  the  Zornitza  over 
the  land,  they  sowed  broadcast  the  seeds  of  a  rich  harvest, 
while  in  their  schools  they  prepared  many  for  leadership  in 
the  coming  time. 

The  pleadings  of  Albanians  for  missionary  teachers  in  the 

earlier  years  has  been  noted.     In  1905  they  were  made  more 

emphatic  when  an  Albanian   bey   appeared  at  the 

Entering       g^^rd  rooms  in  Boston,  saying  that  he  had  come 

Albania  .      ,    ,    ,-      p   ,  .  i  ,    r 

to  present  m  behalf  of  his  people   a  request  tor 

missionaries.  Regardless  of  the  Board's  declared  inability  to 
add  a  new  mission  to  its  financial  load,  disallowing  any  diffi- 
culty in  the  estabhshment  of  definitely  Christian  schools  among 


THE  NEARER  EAST  409 

his  people  because  of  Moslem  allegiance,  he  declared  his  appeal 
could  not  be  denied;  if  refused  now,  it  should  be  repeated. 
Such  a  plea  was  not  to  be  forgotten  even  if  it  could  not  be 
granted,  and  when,  in  1907,  two  American  ladies  offered  to 
furnish  funds  to  found  and  sustain  for  five  years  a  mission  to  the 
Albanians,  the  offer  was  joyfully  accepted  and  the  mission  begun. 

The  first  missionaries.  Rev.  and  Mrs.  P.  B.  Kennedy,  sailed 
in  that  year  and,  after  being  detained  for  three  months  at 
Salonica  by  the  Turkish  government,  were  at  last  allowed  to 
go  in  to  Kortcha,  where  work  had  already  been  begun  through 
Miss  Kyrias'  girls'  school  and  Mr.  Tsilka's  evangelistic  labors. 
They  were  thus  on  the  ground  when  the  revolution  opened  to 
them,  as  to  all  missionaries  in  Turkey,  the  freedom  of  the  land. 
The  Ericksons,  following  a  year  later,  were  at  once  given 
passports  without  question.  Though  meeting  with  some  prej- 
udice and  suspicion,  and  even  being  driven  out  from  Tirana, 
where  they  first  located,  they  found  a  welcome  and  a  field  in 
the  important  city  of  Elbasan,  which  thus  became  the  new 
station  among  the  eager  and  promising  Albanians. 

The  effect  of  this  revolution  was  to  put  upon  the  Board  new 

responsibilities,  and  to  open  to  it  unprecedented  opportunities. 

At    once    all    schools,    higher    and    lower,    became 

A    JTgw 

Ch  11  crowded,  Mohammedan  youth  pressing  in  with  the 

Armenian.  A  high  Turkish  official,  speaking  to  a 
throng  of  Armenians  on  the  steps  of  Euphrates  College,  at 
Harpoot,  said:  ''Hitherto  only  the  Armenians  have  been  able 
to  avail  themselves  of  the  privileges  of  this  college.  We  Turks 
have  been  forbidden  to  send  our  children  here.  That  is  all 
changed  now  and  we  will  share  with  you  in  the  enjoyment  of 
what  this  institution  offers  to  all  who  come  within  its  doors." 
New  governors  even  sought  advice  and  help  of  missionaries 
and  of  Armenian  leaders  in  political  and  educational  matters. 
At  the  first  general  congress  ever  held  by  the  Albanians  in 
Monastir,  November,  1908,  and  which  was  called  to  decide 
upon  an  alphal^et  for  their  language,  the  two  Albanians  repre- 


410  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

senting  the  Board  in  that  field,  Messrs.  Kyrias  and  Tsilka, 
were  influential  members,  and  the  alphabet  selected  was  one 
which  missionaries  had  helped  to  create.  Conditions  varied 
much  with  the  character  of  the  officials  and  the  temper  of 
different  localities,  but  all  over  the  empire  there  was  a  new 
spirit  and  a  new  thrill  of  enthusiasm  in  mission  work,  and  in 
all  the  affairs  of  the  evangelical  communities. 

Whereupon,  in  April,  1909,  appeared  almost  simultaneously 
at  Constantinople  and  in  the  region  of  Adana  and  Tarsus  in 
The  Central  Turkey  a  sudden  and   terrifying   reaction. 

Counter-  At  the  capital  it  came  as  a  revolt  of  the  soldiers 
Revolution  against  their  officers,  in  the  attempt  to  overthrow 
the  reform  government  and  to  set  on  foot  the  wholesale 
slaughter  of  Christians  throughout  the  city.  In  Cilicia  there 
was  a  succession  of  furious  massacres,  designed  to  exterminate 
the  Armenians,  and  which  did  effect  the  slaughter  of  thousands, 
the  wiping  out  of  entire  villages,  the  burning  of  churches, 
schools,  and  houses,  and  a  wild  flight  into  hiding  of  all  who 
escaped  sword  and  fire.  It  was  soon  evident  that  the  two 
events  were  connected  if  they  were  not  equafly  due  to  the 
wily  and  desperate  sultan,  who  was  making  one  supreme  effort 
to  recover  his  lost  power,  an  effort  which  the  Young  Turk 
leaders  fortunately  stifled.  An  inciting  cause  of  the  attack  in 
Cilicia  was  the  anger  and  alarm  of  the  Turks  over  the  activity 
of  some  Armenian  revolutionists. 

The  immediate  concern  of  missionary  interest  in  this  counter- 
revolution was  the  tragedy  on  the  plain  of  Cilicia.  Adana  was 
the  center  of  the  outbreak,  where  in  the  first  slaughter  two 
missionaries  laid  down  their  fives;  one.  Rev.  D.  Miner  Rogers, 
just  entering  upon  a  service  of  great  promise  for  the  Board 
at  Hadjin;  the  other  a  fellow  worker  of  the  Mennonite  Church 
of  America,  who  likewise  happened  to  be  in  Adana  at  the  time, 
in  attendance  upon  the  annual  meeting  of  the  Central  Turkey 
Mission.  Of  the  thirty-five  churches  connected  with  this 
mission  a  score  lost  their   pastors,  many  of   whom  were  on 


THE  NEARER  EAST  411 

their  way  to  the  annual  meeting.  One  group  of  these  travelers 
was  consumed  in  the  burning  of  the  church  at  Osmaniyeh, 
where  they  had  sought  refuge.  Besides  these  leaders  perished 
some  30,000  Christians  of  all  sects,  comparatively  few  of  the 
attacking  Moslems  being  killed,  as,  except  in  the  cities,  they 
met  with  little  opposition. 

The  slaughter  was  systematically  extended.  Armed  bands 
took  train  to  Tarsus  to  reproduce  the  scenes  of  Adana,  after- 
ward spreading  out  over  the  villages  of  the  plain  and  far  up 
on  the  Taurus  range,  in  remorseless  purpose  to  kill  and  destroy. 
In  one  village,  of  ninety  families  only  four  married  men 
remained  and  not  more  than  ten  escaped  in  all;  in  many 
cases  women  and  children  were  carried  off  for  slaves. 

In  fierceness,  though  not  in  extent,  this  massacre  surpassed 
that  of  1895.  The  atrocity  of  the  tortures  devised,  the  utter 
disregard  of  promises,  and  the  fanatic  hate  which  even  dashed 
to  pieces  infants  snatched  from  their  mothers'  arms  are  almost 
incredible.  While  the  massacres  were  confined  within  this 
comparatively  small  territory,  the  terror  and  disturbance 
spread  through  the  interior  and  even  beyond.  At  lonely  Had- 
jin,  in  the  mountains,  five  missionary  women,  without  a  man 
of  their  race  to  defend  them,  endured  one  long  week  of  suspense 
until  the  siege  was  lifted  that  had  held  them  in  hourly  peril. 
Afterward  it  was  known  that  plans  had  been  laid  for  massacres 
in  many  centers;  and  that  they  had  all  wonderfully  failed. 

Relief  was  undertaken  in  the  cities  even  before  the  fires 
had  cooled.  On  the  day  following  the  first  massacre  22,000 
people  were  fed  in  Adana  alone.  Competent  committees  were 
at  once  organized  in  which  the  missionaries  were  to  the  fore, 
and  relief  funds  began  to  come  in  from  all  over  the  world. 
English  and  American  warships,  upon  arriving,  despatched 
their  forces  to  help  restore  order  and  soon  a  systematic  effort 
to  meet  the  emergency  was  under  way.  The  Turkish  Parlia- 
ment at  once  voted  £30,000  and  despatched  its  representatives 
to  take  control  of  the  situation  and  execute  justice.     With 


412  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

the  first  moment  of  opportunity  the  missionaries  began  to 
go  out  over  the  plain,  searching  for  those  whom  they  might 
comfort  and  help,  and  systematic  tours  of  relief  were  under- 
taken by  many  of  them.  The  British  vice-consul,  Major 
C.  H.  M.  Doughty-Wyhe,  whose  courage  and  prompt  action 
brought  the  first  voice  of  authority  to  stop  the  slaughter  at 
Adana,  expressed  his  appreciation  of  the  missionaries'  service  in 
saying,  ''The  personnel  of  the  American  mission  has  increased, 
if  it  were  possible,  their  already  high  reputation;  they  work 
without  ceasing." 

The  months  that  have  passed  since  these  awful  events  have 
on  the  whole  increased  the  courage  and  hopefulness  of  those 
Signs  of  who  have  been  watching  the  progress  of  affairs 
Better  in    Turkey.     The   difficulties    in    the   way   of   the 

Days  Young  Turk  party,  allowing  them   all   honesty  of 

purpose  and  desire,  are  enormous.  Despite  the  fact  that 
the  Sheik  ul  Islam  has  declared  that  constitutional  government 
is  in  accord  with  Moslem  law  and  that  Christians  and  Moham- 
medans are  entitled  to  equal  rights  under  the  constitution, 
there  are  those  who  still  think  it  doubtful  whether  the  Turk 
can  deal  fairly  or  live  friendly  with  those  of  other  faiths.  On 
the  other  hand,  the  uniform  testimony  in  every  part  of  Turkey 
is  that  a  wonderful  change  is  being  wrought  by  the  new  regime. 
The  new  vali  at  Adana  has  commended  himself  to  the  mis- 
sionaries there  both  by  his  words  and  actions.  The  execution 
of  some  fifty  Mohammedans,  many  of  them  representative 
men,  who  were  implicated  in  the  massacres,  has  been  a  reas- 
suring exhibition  of  Moslem  justice.  And  all  over  the  empire 
the  leadership  of  the  schools  and  higher  institutions,  the  eager- 
ness for  their  privileges  which  greater  liberty  has  brought, 
and  the  signs  of  new  life  and  purpose  among  all  races,  are  to 
the  missionaries  a  call  to  yet  larger  undertakings,  with  the 
promise  of  immensely  larger  results.  It  looks  to  the  men  on 
the  Board's  watch-towers  in  Turkey  as  though  the  morning 
had  indeed  come. 


Chapter  XXII 

SOUTHERN  ASIA 

In  October,  1881,  the  Marathi  Mission  celebrated  the  round- 
ing out  of  its  first  fifty  years  of  organized  Ufe.     There  were 

now  eight  stations,  seventy-six  outstations,  twenty- 
Indeed  ^^     ^^^^  churches,  with  numerous  aUied  institutions  and 

Hues  of  work,  of  which  the  1000  native  Chris- 
tians in  attendance  were  the  visible  witness.  The  times 
encouraged  some  jubilation,  inasmuch  as  there  were  now  signs 
of  a  more  general  movement  toward  Christianity  among  the 
people.  The  Board's  missionaries  had  been  foremost  in  relief 
work  during  the  famines  of  1877-79,  which  afflicted  west  as 
well  as  south  India.  They  were  now  reaping  their  reward  in 
a  new  responsiveness  to  their  message.  The  times  of  calamity 
have  ever  been  harvest  times  on  mission  fields,  as  wretched 
peoples,  realizing  over  against  the  powerlessness  of  their  trusted 
gods  the  kindness  of  these  ministers  of  a  foreign  religion,  have 
come  for  help  in  the  deeper  needs  of  their  hearts  to  those  who 
have  relieved  their  bodily  distresses.  Such  an  extraordinary 
movement  toward  Christianity  was  witnessed  at  the  opening 
of  this  period  both  in  the  Marathi  and  Madura  Missions,  and 
to  both,  with  the  joy  of  large  accessions,  came  an  increase  of 
task  in  making  sincere  and  intelligent  Christians  out  of 
impressed  but  undisciplined  disciples.  The  progress  in  spiritual 
perception  or  even  in  moral  aspiration  was  still  slow.  Many 
would  listen,  read  if  they  were  able,  and  forsake  their  idols; 
while  the  highest  motives  were  not  yet  controlling.  The 
burden  of  their  thoughts  was  often  for  food  and  raiment;  the 
desire  for  education  was  largely  from  worldly  ambition.     Even 

413 


414  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

so,  the  school  became  the  doorway  into  a  new  Hfe;  it  gave 
chance  to  waken  and  guide  the  higher  purpose. 

The  time  had  now  come  for  the  educational  department  of 
the  mission  to  be  still  further  developed.  The  Indian  govern- 
The  Era  of  ment  was  cordial  to  the  mission  schools  for  the 
Educational  natives  and  disposed  to  render  substantial  aid  to 
Growth  such  as  met  its  advancing  standards  of  instruction. 
Considerable  grants  had  been  secured  by  many  of  the  Board's 
schools,  and  so  far  without  embarrassment;  to  hold  them 
it  was  necessary  to  readjust  and  unify.  By  1887  the  high 
school  at  Ahmednagar,  with  its  290  students,  mostly  of  high 
caste,  was  allied  with  the  University  of  Bombay  and  duly 
opened  as  a  college ;  at  the  same  time,  in  the  Madura  Mission, 
the  school  at  Pasumalai,  with  253  pupils,  was  raised  to  the 
rank  of  a  college,  and  a  little  later  (1893)  Jaffna  College,  with 
135  students,  was  allied  to  the  University  of  Calcutta  and 
its  standard  raised. 

Tributary  to  these  higher  institutions  were  many  secondary 
and  boarding-schools,  which  drew  to  themselves  the  pick  of 
the  youth,  not  only  from  the  stations,  but  from  the  whole  field 
of  the  mission;  underneath  all  were  those  local  centers  of  light 
and  impulse,  the  village  schools. 

Institutions  for  special  training  were  devised  to  meet  par- 
ticular needs,  such  as  normal  schools  for  girls  and  English  schools 
for  Hindu  boys,  like  the  one  founded  and  supported  by  Dr. 
Palmer  at  Madura,  in  which  over  200  Hindu  boys,  among 
them  many  Brahmans,  were  studying  the  Bible  daily.  Indus- 
trial education  was  under  way  in  the  manual  training  school 
at  Vadala  and  in  the  industrial  school  at  Sirur.  The  latter 
received  a  grant  of  6000  rupees  ($2000)  in  1888,  and  Lord 
Ray,  governor  of  the  Bombay  presidency,  wrote  to  Mr.  Winsor 
that  for  this  pioneer  work  he  had  ''indisputable  title  to  the 
support  of  the  public  and  the  friendly  assistance  of  the  govern- 
ment." 

In  the  conduct  of  all  these  schools  the  missionaries  rejoiced 


SOUTHERN  ASIA  415 

to  feel  that  they  were  maintaining  an  evangeHstic  agency  of 
the  most  enduring  type.  A  missionary  from  India,  visiting 
his  brethren  in  Ceylon,  declared,  ''I  think  that  in  Jaffna  you 
will  Christianize  the  people  through  your  schools." 

The  presence  of  these  educational  institutions  in  the  great 
centers  compelled  attention;  the  quiet  but  leavening  influence 
Religious  upon  Indian  life  of  their  graduates  and  of  the  Chris- 
Develop-  tians  trained  in  the  churches  was  overcoming  preju- 
ment  of  dice,  while  the  service  of  the  missionaries  to  the 
the  Fields  lowliest  in  the  land  won  the  approval  of  leading 
Brahmans  and  of  local  officials.  Way  was  opened  for  private 
interviews  and  even  public  addresses,  stimulating  thought  on 
Christianity  and  civilization.  The  message  of  such  Christian 
teachers  as  Dr.  J.  Henry  Barrows  and  President  Charles  Cuth- 
bert  Hall  broke  down  barriers  and  increased  the  zeal  and 
aspiration  of  the  native  church,  while  in  Ceylon  before  the 
close  of  the  century  all  the  eighteen  churches  had  become 
self-supporting,  except  the  two  youngest,  and  all  but  two  had 
ordained  pastors.  In  the  Marathi  field,  notwithstanding  its 
poverty,  more  rapid  progress  was  being  made  toward  self- 
support. 

New  lines  of  religious  expression  and  culture  were  being 
devised.  The  Christian  Endeavor  Society  proved  most  con- 
genial to  Indian  soil  and  developed  the  evangelistic  spirit. 
The  tone  of  many  churches  was  altogether  changed  by  it, 
and  the  missionaries  rejoiced  to  find  that  the  idea  of  working 
for  others  was  coming  to  be  recognized  in  native  Christianity. 
In  the  Madura  district  and,  indeed,  beyond  it,  Dr.  John  P. 
Jones  was  a  leader  in  promoting  this  new  agency;  at  one  time 
president  of  the  Society  for  India,  it  was  in  part  for  his  service 
to  the  empire  in  this  way  that  he  received  a  medal  from  the 
Crown.  In  Madura,  also,  the  Pasumalai  Press  was  putting 
forth  a  semi-monthly  Tamil  newspaper,  the  True  News,  which 
Dr.  George  T.  Washburn  founded  in  1870  and  edited  for 
twenty-six  years,  turning  it  over  to  the  mission  in  1896,  together 


416  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

with  the  printing  establishment  he  had  acquired.  The  Madura 
Evangehcal  Society  and  the  Widows'  Aid  Society  indicate 
other  new  hues  of  Christian  service.  In  the  Marathi  Mission 
the  Chapin  Home  in  1885  opened  its  doors  to  Hindu  women 
driven  forth  from  their  homes  as  they  became  Christians,  and 
to  those  who  wished  to  prepare  for  self-support. 

Other  undertakings  indicate  the  enlargement  of  the  time. 
A  Young  Men's  Home,  begun  by  Dr.  Abbott,  was  at  once  suc- 
cessful as  a  Christian  domicile  for  young  men  exposed  to  the 
pitfalls  of  Bombay  as  they  came  to  the  city  for  employment; 
a  native  Indian  Christian,  Dr.  Keskar,  established  at  Sholapur 
a  leper  asylum  that  became  a  shining  example  to  the  amazed 
Hindus.  Though  the  victims  of  that  loathsome  disease  could 
not  be  cured,  it  was  found  that  much  might  be  done  to  mitigate 
their  suffering,  employ  and  divert  their  minds,  and  comfort 
their  hearts  through  the  knowledge  of  Him  who  had  shown 
himself  the  Saviour  also  of  the  lepers.  The  work  of  Bible 
women  was  every^vhere  pressed  as  of  prime  value,  perhaps 
receiving  special  emphasis  in  Ceylon. 

The  plague  broke  out  again  in  Bombay  in  1897  and  soon 
spread  to  the  mainland,  where  famine  already  was  rife.  So 
Famine  virulent  and  sweeping  became  this  scourge  that 
and  Plague  stern  measures  were  required.  Riots  broke  out  in 
Again  Bombay;     business    was     for     a    time    paralyzed. 

Schools  at  Ahmednagar,  Sholapur,  and  elsewhere  were  closed 
and  the  pupils  sent  outside  to  segregation  camps.  The  strain 
on  the  missionaries'  strength  and  sympathies  was  intense; 
yet  few  cases  of  plague  appeared  in  mission  compounds  and 
no  lives  were  there  lost.  The  natives  wonderingly  said,  ''Did 
your  God  give  you  a  charmed  life  that  you  dare  to  walk  our 
plague-stricken  streets?" 

Three  years  of  plague  culminated  in  1900  in  a  year  of  yet 
more  terrible  famine.  Relief  funds  of  $121,000,  raised  by  the 
Congregationalist  and  the  Advance,  were  distributed  by  the 
missionaries;  it  was  for  them  a  year  of  unprecedented  care, 


SOUTHERN  ASIA  417 

but  also  of  opportunity;  a  committee  in  India  dispensed  over 
$200,000  sent  from  the  Christian  Herald  relief  fund.  As  a 
recognition  of  his  service  as  secretary  of  this  committee,  Dr. 
R.  A.  Hume  received  in  1900  the  gold  medal  of  the  Kaisar-i- 
hind  order.  This  same  year,  at  the  request  of  the  collector 
of  Ahmednagar,  Dr.  Ballantine  went  to  that  city  and  stayed 
there  for  four  months,  fighting  the  plague  which  had  broken 
out  again.  The  amount  and  character  of  the  services  thus 
rendered  to  the  stricken  region  are  almost  beyond  calcula- 
tion. The  records  show  that  the  American  mission  took  in 
more  than  2845  orphans;  distributed  seed  rice  to  24,665  small 
farmers;  assisted  1650  others  to  obtain  oxen  to  plow  their 
land.  Unfortunately  the  financial  stringency  of  the  American 
Board  just  then  compelled  a  reduction  in  appropriations, 
adding  seriously  to  the  burden  of  the  time. 

As  in  periods  of  catastrophe  before,  the  progress  of  Chris- 
tianity was  now  marked.  It  was  a  time  to  be  careful  in  test- 
ing new  converts  and  in  preparation  for  church  membership. 
Yet,  with  all  caution  in  this  matter,  during  the  year  1900  more 
than  three  times  as  many  persons  united  with  the  churches 
of  the  Marathi  Mission  as  had  been  received  in  any  preced- 
ing year.  At  the  same  time  there  was  evident  a  mass  move- 
ment toward  Christianity  among  the  out-caste  Mangs.  Their 
religion  was  mainly  worship  of  the  cholera  goddess,  inspired 
by  deadly  fear.  In  1901  the  Mangs  of  175  villages  in  the 
Vadala  district  sent  in  a  petition  that  they  be  received  into 
the  Christian  Church.  This  did  not  mean  that  they  were  all 
Christian  at  heart,  or  even  understood  the  meaning  of  the 
word  '^Christian";  but  it  did  mean  that  a  multitude  of  people 
felt  the  insufficiency  of  their  own  religion  and,  caught  by  a 
vision  of  something  better,  were  groping  after  it. 

A  legacy  from  plague  and  famine  in  the  Marathi  field  was  a 
host  of  orphans;  3299  of  them  could  be  counted  in  1902  as 
having  come  under  the  care  of  the  missionaries,  a  heavy  tax 
on  already  overburdened  men  and  women.     The  founding   of 


418  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

orphans'  homes  naturally  led  to  a  development  of  industrial 
training;  out  of  that  grew  a  new  appreciation  of  the  value  of 
Enlarging  such  education  to  India  and  of  the  possibility  of  mak- 
Industrial  ing  it  largely  self-supporting.  Various  trades  were 
Work  taught,   as  at  Sholapur,   where  Mr.  Gates  formed 

classes  in  carpentry,  simple  masonry,  and  rug  and  lace  weaving. 
Similar  lines  of  work  were  undertaken  at  Ahmednagar,  where 
there  was  organized,  under  the  care  of  Rev.  James  Smith,  the 
School  of  Industrial  Arts,  named  from  its  founder,  Sir  D.  M. 
Petit,  a  Hindu  baronet.  Asked  what  was  made  in  the  work- 
shops of  this  school  with  more  than  250  scholars,  Mr.  Smith 
replied,  ''Men";  the  goods  sold  were  the  by-products.  At  the 
Industrial  Exhibition  held  at  Madras  this  school,  exhibiting 
in  three  departments,  took  the  prize  in  each.  New  forms  of 
industrial  help  were  devised,  as  in  the  case  of  Mrs.  Abbott's 
industries  for  widows  in  Bombay,  and  particularly  through 
Mr.  Churchill's  distinguished  service,  not  only  as  superin- 
tendent of  these  lines,  but  in  inventing  new  machines.  His 
improved  hand  loom,  usable  in  the  homes  of  the  people,  has 
brought  him  high  praise  from  the  government  and  a  prophecy 
that  this  machine  will  be  to  India  what  the  spinning-jenny 
has  been  to  America. 

The  quickened  growth  of  the  churches  and  the  increasing 
calls  for  Christian  teaching  from  all  parts  of  these  fields  brought 

new  and  heavier  responsibilities  on  the  missionary 
p  ,.  and  native  leaders.     In  southern  India  the  need  of 

preachers  and  teachers  vv^as  far  greater  than  could 
be  met.  The  poHcy  of  the  Madura  Mission  to  receive  as  adher- 
ents all  who  turned  from  Hinduism  and  applied  for  Christian 
teaching  had  brought  into  the  mission's  care  many  village 
congregations  composed  of  clusters  of  families  not  yet  ready 
to  be  organized  into  a  church.  To  them  were  assigned  cate- 
chists  to  teach  the  children,  to  visit  and  preach  in  surrounding 
villages,  and  on  Sundays  and  in  the  mid-week  meetings  to 
lead  the  village  congregation  in  its  worship. 


SOUTHERN  ASIA  419 

The  task  of  Christian  training  under  such  conditions  is 
very  great:  the  most  primary  things  are  to  be  taught,  the 
elements  of  morahty  as  well  as  religion  gone  over  again  and 
again,  year  in  and  year  out.  The  simple  and  oftentimes  inex- 
perienced catechist  has  to  be  physician  in  sickness,  spiritual 
adviser,  judge,  and  defender.  All  desired  results  are  not 
immediately  secured,  yet  this  is  the  way  to  instil  Christianity 
into  the  life  of  the  people.  The  amount  of  such  work  through- 
out the  Madura  Mission  grew  to  be  enormous.  The  field  of 
evangelism,  also,  had  become  wide  open  and  so,  if  possible, 
more  appealing.  In  1902  Mr.  Eddy  visited  1200  villages  in 
various  parts  of  the  district,  finding  the  people  poor  and  igno- 
rant indeed,  yet  remarkably  responsive  and  faithful,  and  many 
of  the  native  helpers,  all  things  considered,  doing  splendid 
work.  A  Native  Evangelical  Society,  which  so  early  as  1846 
sought  to  unite  the  Christians  of  the  eight  stations  in  support- 
ing catechists  among  their  countrymen,  in  1885  renewed  its 
purpose  to  undertake  this  work,  besides  providing  for  the 
support  of  pastors,  and  has  since  maintained  a  permanent 
itinerating  agency  to  reach  non-Christians,  which  visits  different 
stations  to  work  for  limited  periods.  The  students  of  the 
theological  seminary  at  Pasumalai  also  make  an  annual  tour 
with  their  instructors  for  the  purpose  of  conducting  evan- 
gelistic work  while  getting  close  to  the  life  of  the  people. 

In  the  Marathi  Mission,  also,  the  class  of  adherents  to  Chris- 
tianity is  clearly  defined.  Those  who  desire  to  become  Chris- 
tians, but  have  not  yet  been  taught  its  simplest  truths,  are 
admitted  to  a  covenant  after  the  pattern  of  one  long  used  in 
Madura,  which  pledges  them  to  renounce  the  Hindu  religious 
practises,  to  remain  under  regular  Christian  instruction,  to 
observe  the  Sabbath  as  a  day  of  worship,  to  make  some  con- 
tribution every  week  to  a  Christian  church,  to  use  all  possible 
influence  against  early  and  irregular  marriages,  and  to  follow 
Christian  customs  with  reference  to  burial  of  the  dead.  In 
this  field,  also,  has  evangelistic  work  developed  in  connection 


420  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

with  the  ministry  in  rehef  camps,  in  house  to  house  visitation, 
street  preaching,  and  the  labors  of  more  than  100  Bible 
women. 

The  compact  mission  in  Ceylon  is  an  example  of  intensive 
farming,  having  eighteen  churches  with  more  than  2000  mem- 
bers, four  boarding-schools,  136  village  schools,  with  more  than 
10,000  pupils,  two  hospitals,  an  industrial  plant  and  printing 
establishment,  native  contributions  amounting  to  more  than 
$8000  —  all  of  which  suggests  a  well-tilled  field.  Evangelistic 
work  here  can  now  be  carried  on  by  the  native  churches,  in 
some  cases  the  supervision  of  missionaries  being  merely  nominal. 

Every  station  of  these  missions  was  visited  in  1902  by  a 
deputation,  composed  of  Rev.  J.  F.  Loba,  D.D.,  Mr.  Wilham 
The  F.  Whittemore,  and  Secretary  Barton.     Their  care- 

Deputation  ful  survey  emphasized  the  contrast  between  the 
of  1902  years  of  beginning  and  the  present  era  of  results. 
In  place  of  two  unwelcome  missionaries  struggling  to  get  a 
doubtful  foothold  in  Bombay,  the  deputation  looked  upon 
three  established  missions,  located  in  large  and  developed 
stations,  and  housed  in  commodious  buildings,  holding  titles 
to  all  property,  esteemed  by  government  officials  and  favored 
with  every  privilege  and  grant  which  they  could  bestow,  while 
respected  and  trusted  by  masses  of  the  people,  and  winning 
more  surely  every  year  the  regard  of  the  higher  classes  of 
native  society.  As  they  went  about  Bombay,  Ahmednagar, 
or  Madura,  or  passed  from  one  to  another  of  the  closely  grouped 
stations  in  Ceylon,  the  deputation  was  profoundly  impressed 
with  the  substantial  quality  of  the  work  being  done  and  the 
size,  variety,  and  strength  of  the  institutions  through  which 
it  was  wrought. 

In  every  department  of  mission  activity  progress  was  now 
more  rapid.  Within  the  last  few  years  in  the  Marathi  Mission 
alone  there  had  been  great  increase  in  church  membership; 
nearly  1100  were  added  to  the  churches  the  year  before  the 
deputation's  visit.     New  calls  for  missionary  work  were  com- 


SOUTHERN  ASIA  421 

ing  from  every  quarter;  the  resources  of  the  native  agency 
were  being  pushed  to  the  utmost.  In  Madura,  in  the  field 
around  the  Aruppokottai  station,  there  were  no  less  than  120 
separate  villages  in  which  Christians  were  to  be  found.  The 
four  pastors  in  that  district  were  almost  crushed  with  the 
responsibilities  of  their  task.  In  the  three  fields  missionaries 
were  residing  at  twenty-five  different  centers,  native  Chris- 
tians and  other  workers  at  more  than  900  other  places.  Already 
there  were  more  than  12,000  church  members  in  the  missions 
and  over  30,000  who  had  broken  with  their  old  faiths  to 
join  the  Christian  communities.  With  the  missionary  force, 
comprising  now  nearly  100  men  and  women,  were  associated 
1500  trained  native  workers.  The  principle  of  self-sup- 
port, earnestly  pressed  in  this  mission,  was  now  producing 
substantial  and  increasing  results.  By  1909  it  could  be  re- 
ported that  nine  evangelists,  several  school  teachers,  and 
Bible  women,  besides  all  the  pastors,  were  supported  by  native 
contributions,  which  amounted  to  18,537  rupees,  or  over  $6000. 
A  complete  system  of  education  was  articulated,  from  the 
village  schools,  sometimes  under  a  tree  or  in  a  thatched  shed, 
to  the  college  and  professional  school,  besides  other  special  in- 
stitutions to  meet  local  needs,  in  all  making  a  list  of  educational 
agencies  almost  bewildering  to  the  inspectors.  Of  evangelistic  as 
well  as  educational  benefit,  these  schools  had  come  to  be  a  social 
force  also,  opening  new  doors,  breaking  down  barriers,  and 
broadening  the  field  of  the  mission.  One  boarding-school  was 
visited  in  which  pupils  from  eighteen  different  castes  were 
enrolled,  dwelling,  eating,  and  studying  together,  an  object 
lesson  to  the  people  of  all  that  region.  A  fresh  outbreak  of 
caste  prejudice  in  the  Uduvil  (Oodooville)  Girls'  School  in 
Ceylon  at  this  time  was  so  well  handled  that  it  resulted  in  a 
real  revival  through  which  the  school  blessed  the  community. 
The  confidence  which  the  governments  both  of  India  and 
Ceylon  felt  in  the  mission  schools  was  evidenced  to  the  depu- 
tation by  the  fact  that  grants  then  being  made  to  these  schools 


422  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

amounted  to  $26,000,  far  more  than  the  Board  itself  was  con- 
tributing toward  their  support.  Indeed,  the  government 
grants  and  the  fees  of  the  pupils  were  now  larger  by  some 
$8000  than  the  total  appropriations  of  the  Board  for  the  general 
work  of  these  three  missions. 

The  important  and  expanding  medical  department  was 
practically  new  in  these  later  years.  It  was  not  until  1904  that 
an  equipped  hospital  appeared  in  the  Marathi  Mission,  though 
Dr.  Norris  at  Bombay  and  Dr.  Ballantine  at  Rahuri  had  con- 
ducted medical  work  without  hospitals  in  the  70s,  and  Dr. 
JuUa  Bissell  had  made  the  beginnings  of  a  hospital  for  women 
at  Ahmednagar  in  1894.  In  Madura  and  Ceylon  the  medi- 
cal work  had  developed  earlier,  until  they  had  large  and 
finely  equipped  hospitals;  the  Albert  Victor,  at  Madura,  under 
Dr.  Van  Allen,  being  a  gift  outright  from  wealthy  Hindus, 
several  of  whom  had  been  his  patients,  while  the  McLeod 
Hospital  for  Women  and  Children  at  Inuvil,  Ceylon,  came 
through  funds  raised  by  the  Misses  Leitch  from  friends  in 
England  and  America. 

The  task  of  preparing  and  publishing  vernacular  Christian 
literature  was  stimulated  by  a  growing  demand  for  it;  the  sev- 
eral mission  papers,  the  Dnyanodaya  and  the  Balbodhmewa,  or 
children's  paper,  in  the  Marathi  field;  the  True  News  and  Joy- 
ful News  in  Madura,  and  the  Christian  Witness  in  Ceylon,  all 
had  an  assured  and  widening  circulation  throughout  their  fields; 
the  output  of  the  press  was  more  than  doubled  in  one  year. 
The  Marathi  Mission  now  maintained  no  press,  but  made  use 
of  local  publishing  houses,  but  the  printing  plant  in  Ceylon, 
which  had  been  turned  over  to  private  hands,  was  taken  over 
again  by  the  mission  and  attached  to  the  industrial  depart- 
ment of  the  TeUippallai  (Tillipalli)  school. 

The  first  decade  of  the  twentieth  century  has  witnessed 
some  new  and  significant  movements  in  Indian  life  and  thought, 
supposed  to  betoken  the  stir  of  a  national  feeling.  The  mixture 
of  races  in  India  and  the  division  of  her  people  into  sects  and 


SOUTHERN  ASIA  423 

castes  make  it  difficult  to  define  any  clear  national  spirit,  though 
the  formation  and  continuance  of  an  Indian  National  Congress 
The  Stir  point  in  that  direction.  Criticisms  of  the  British 
of  a  New  government  and  a  demand  for  the  control  of  India  by 
India  j^ej.  people  may  easily  be  explained  and  discounted, 

but  the  fact  remains  that  there  is  a  real  if  sometimes  vague 
unrest  among  the  more  ambitious  and  educated  classes  which 
in  some  quarters  seems  to  be  also  sifting  down  among  the 
masses.  It  makes  this  a  serious  though  hopeful  time  for 
India,  and  one  that  calls  for  alertness  and  adaptation  on  the 
part  of  all  missionary  workers  and  the  native  church.  Such 
adaptation  is  being  earnestly  sought.  Already  this  stir  of 
new  life  is  bringing  gains  to  missionary  work.  New  mass 
movements  toward  Christianity  are  occurring,  as  among  the 
large  and  substantial  farming  class  in  the  Marathi  Mission 
and  from  the  robber  caste  in  other  sections.  Proud  Brah- 
mans  are  reading  the  Bible  and  studying  with  confessed  admira- 
tion the  life  of  Christ.  Educated  Hindus  actually  have  formed 
themselves  into  societies  to  carry  out  social  and  moral  reforms 
that  they  admit  are  based  on  Christian  teaching.  Missionary 
institutions  are  openly  admired,  patronized,  and  even  imitated. 
In  that  most  bigoted  and  sacred  city  of  Wai  a  missionary  of 
the  American  Board  has  been  associated  with  Brahmans  both 
as  counselor  and  administrator  of  pubhc  affairs.  There  are 
indications  that  a  host  of  India's  higher  classes  are  being  more 
or  less  consciously  influenced  by  the  Christian  gospel.  The 
new  spirit  brings  its  own  difficulties.  Sometimes  it  fosters 
insubordinate  and  revolutionary  temper  among  students; 
again,  reaction  to  the  ancient  faith  and  worship  is  adjudged 
to  be  a  part  of  patriotism.  Yet  on  the  whole  the  unrest  of 
the  time  in  India  (it  is  not  much  felt  in  Ceylon)  is  an  advan- 
tage to  the  missionary  as  giving  him  a  new  approach. 

The  government  continues  to  help  the  cultural  and  humani- 
tarian features  of  missionary  work,  but  it  has  raised  the 
standard  of  requirements  for  the  higher  institutions  of  learning 


424  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

and  has  conditioned  its  grants  thereupon;  schools  and  colleges 
of  the  missions  have  been  forced  to  seek  enlarged  equipment 
and  to  make  some  readjustments.  In  Madura  the  college  has 
been  moved  from  Pasumalai  into  the  city  of  Madura,  where  a 
new  and  adequate  building  has  been  erected,  and  where  it 
greatly  needs  now  a  fuller  support  that  it  may  meet  the  require- 
ments of  a  college  of  its  grade.  High  schools,  normal  schools, 
and  industrial  departments,  together  with  the  theological 
school,  remain  at  Pasumalai,  the  high  school  in  Madura  being 
kept  as  directly  tributary  to  the  college.  Jaffna  College  has 
made  an  advance  in  grade  with  the  change  of  its  affiliation 
from  Calcutta  University  to  the  University  of  Madras. 

Under  the  spur  of  the  new  times  a  fresh  aggressiveness  has 
come  both  to  the  mission  and  the  native  church.  New  edifices, 
like  the  First  Church  in  Bombay  and  the  First  in  Ahmednagar, 
open  more  inviting  doors  to  the  passers-by  in  those  cities. 
Missionaries,  native  pastors,  and  Christian  leaders  are  showing 
new  determination  to  get  outside  their  localities  and  communi- 
ties and  to  evangelize  their  entire  fields.  The  villages  are 
being  sought  with  new  enthusiasm,  and  stereopticon  and  song 
services  are  being  used  throughout  this  field  to  win  audiences 
and  to  sow  the  seed  of  the  gospel. 

To  give  greater  efficiency  to  the  churches  and  to  stimulate 
their  pastors  and  members  to  assume  more  responsibility,  the 
Madura  Mission  has  within  a  year  undertaken  such  a  reshaping 
of  church  polity  as  combines  more  closely,  under  direction  of 
the  District  Conference,  the  church  life  of  the  mission.  Similar 
proposals  are  now  made  for  the  Marathi  Mission,  in  the  hope 
that  more  and  more  the  oversight  and  direction  of  church 
life  and  extension  shall  pass  from  the  missionaries  to  the  native 
church. 

A  notable  sign  of  the  times,  in  harmony  with  what  is  trans- 
piring in  other  mission  fields,  are  various  attempts  at  union 
or  cooperation  between  missionary  societies  and  the  native 
churches  on  their  fields.     The  United  Church  of  South  India 


MADURA'S   DIAMOND   JUBILEE 


THE     MARCH     OF    THE     BAXXERS     OF     THE     YEARS THE     XEW    COLLEGE 

BUILDIXG  A    SECTIOX    OF    THE    AXXIVERSARY    CO.MPAXY 


SOUTHERN  ASIA  425 

has  recently  been  formed  by  the  union  of  Presbyterian  and 
Congregational  churches,  the  latter  representing  the  missions 
of  the  London  Missionary  Society  and  the  American  Board. 
It  seeks  to  embody  the  best  features  which  the  experience  of 
the  several  missions  has  devised.  This  Union,  one  of  the  earliest 
and  most  significant  of  all  the  attempts  at  such  combination, 
is  setting  an  example  to  others,  and  is  regarded  as  only  a  begin- 
ning; yet  in  1908  it  included  108  churches,  with  140,000 
Christians.  A  union  theological  college  is  now  assured  at 
Bangalore,  in  which  the  London  Missionary  Society,  the 
United  Free  Church  of  Scotland,  the  English  Wesleyans,  and 
the  Dutch  Reformed  missions  are  to  join,  and  in  which  it  is 
expected  that  the  Board's  Madura  Mission  will  cooperate  as 
fast  as  arrangements  can  be  made.  A  scheme  of  federation 
is  also  proposed  in  the  region  of  the  Marathi  Mission,  where 
consolidation  does  not  yet  seem  feasible.  In  Ceylon,  without 
organic  union,  the  missionary  societies  at  work  in  the  neigh- 
borhood of  Jaffna  have  joined  in  evangelistic  services,  and  the 
Church  Missionary  Society  and  the  Wesleyans,  with  the 
American  Board  mission  forces,  are  seeking  with  utmost  good- 
will and  comity  to  serve  all  the  interests  of  their  close-lying 
fields. 


Chapter  XXIII 
SOUTHERN  AND   CENTRAL  AFRICA 

The  Zulu  Mission  celebrated  its  jubilee  in  1885.  The  con- 
trast with  1835  was  sufficiently  impressive.     That  wild  land 

of  Natal  which  the  pioneers  entered  was  now  a 
A  Jubilee     prosperous  English  colony.     Even  so  far  inland  as 

the  capital,  Pietermaritzburg,  were  all  the  accom- 
paniments of  civihzation:  churches,  schools,  banks,  and  libra- 
ries. Yet  the  pressing  in  to  the  colony  not  only  of  foreigners, 
but  of  Zulus  from  other  districts,  made  the  number  of  heathen 
in  Natal  even  greater  than  in  the  earlier  years,  and  there  were 
still  broad  stretches  of  almost  unmitigated  paganism.  On 
the  field  the  American  Board  had  developed  its  Zulu  Mission 
into  a  force  of  twenty-six  men  and  women,  located  at  nine 
stations,  in  a  territory  stretching  150  miles  from  north  to 
south,  with  no  station  more  than  fifty  miles  from  the  sea,  and 
most  of  them  within  ten  or  twelve  miles  of  the  coast.  The 
labors  of  this  missionary  force,  with  the  137  native  leaders, 
were  directed  upon  fifteen  churches,  with  nearly  800  members; 
forty-one  common  schools  and  four  schools  of  higher  grade, 
in  which,  all  told,  there  were  nearly  2000  under  instruction. 

Two  recent  events  added  to  the  rejoicing  at  this  jubilee: 
one  was  the  exploration  of  a  new  field  to  the  north,  where  the 
native  churches  and  native  leaders  were  preparing  to  under- 
take the  evangelization  of  their  own  people.  The  other  inspir- 
ing event  was  the  pubhcation  in  1883  of  the  complete  Zulu 
Bible,  a  task  to  which  Mr.  Pixley  had  devoted  great  labor, 
both  in  the  translation  of  the  books  of  the  Old  Testament 
and  the  revision  of  the  whole.  Thus  was  given  to  the  Zulu- 
speaking  people  the  entire  Bible  within  fifty  years  from  the 

426 


/         CAPE       UmtwaluVe  ^7^ 

.  XjTlWzumbe 


COLONY 


SOUTHERN   AND   CENTRAL  AFRICA  427 

time  the  missionaries  found  them,  naked  and  savage,  with  an 
unwritten  language  so  intricate  that  it  was  long  before  they 
could  find  any  key  to  it. 

Yet  the  situation  was  not  unqualifiedly  joyous  even  in 
the  days  of  jubilee.  There  were  genuine  Christian  lives  and 
A  Slow  homes  at  all  the  stations,  yet,  with  bright  excep- 
Trans-  tions,  the  tone  of  life  was  low  even  on  the  Mission 
formation  Reserves.  There  was  little  family  government,  little 
self-control,  no  strong  moral  sense,  and  a  prevailing  and  disas- 
trous belief  in  witchcraft.  In  some  cases  it  seemed  to  the 
missionaries  that  the  churches  were  hardly  ready  yet  for 
pastors,  not  knowing  or  appreciating  what  were  their  duties, 
and  so  what  should  be  their  qualifications,  regarding  the  pastor 
more  as  a  petty  chief  than  as  a  religious  teacher.  The  Zulus, 
too,  were  naturally  indolent;  their  wants  were  easily  satisfied, 
and  they  could  contemplate  with  little  concern  the  incoming 
of  Indian  coolies  to  take  the  place  of  their  own  people  who 
did  not  Hke  to  work. 

The  colonial  government,  which  had  formed  its  native 
code  years  before,  when  it  was  not  strong  enough  to  enforce 
English  law,  still  dealt  with  the  Zulus  by  laws  which  legalized 
many  practises  most  adverse  to  the  gospel.  Some  of  the 
native  chiefs,  alarmed  lest  Christianity  should  weaken  their 
power,  were  now  actively  working  against  the  mission,  and 
Roman  Catholic  priests  renewed  their  opposition  as  they  saw 
the  Protestants  winning  a  measure  of  success.  To  add  to  the 
burden,  to  the  mission's  cry  for  reenforcement  the  answer 
came  from  America,  "Retrench!" 

Yet  the  missionaries  never  wavered.  The  results  achieved 
at  Lovedale  by  Dr.  Stewart  stimulated  the  desire  to  attempt 
Fresh  more  in  education,  particularly  in  industrial  lines. 

Plans  and  New  buildings  were  somehow  secured  at  Inanda 
Efforts  Qj^^  Umzumbe,  and  by  1895   these   higher  institu- 

tions, including  the  reopened  Amanzimtoti  Seminary,  were 
providing  larger  facilities  for  training  a  new  and  more  mobile 


428  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

generation  of  Christian  leaders.  Such  devotion  and  unwaver- 
ing faith  were  bound  to  have  their  reward.  At  length  came 
widespread  and  genuine  revivals  of  religion;  the  one  which 
visited  five  stations  in  1892  marked  the  beginning  of  a  new 
era.  The  membership  of  the  churches  had  increased  nearly 
threefold  by  1900,  while  the  force  of  native  helpers  had  grown 
from  168  to  397.  By  1894  the  eighteen  churches  of  the  mission 
had  attained  full  self-support  and  the  Native  Missionary 
Society,  formed  in  1860,  was  now  taking  full  oversight  of  all 
the  churches  in  its  field  and  the  provision  of  its  ministry.  The 
publication  of  a  new  Zulu  hymn  book  and  a  reader,  added  to 
the  current  edition  of  the  Scriptures,  furnished  the  beginnings 
of  Zulu  literature  and  a  stimulus  for  the  aspirations  of  the 
people,  while  the  opening  of  a  mission  to  the  far  north  and  new 
and  urgent  calls  from  fields  nearer  by  were  also  putting  a  helpful 
pressure  upon  the  growing  life  of  the  Christian  communities. 

It  was  recognized  by  all  that  God  had  a  far-reaching  purpose 
to  accomplish  through  this  mission  to  the  Zulus  and  that  the 
time  had  come  for  advance.  As  natives  were  flocking  by 
hundreds  and  thousands  from  all  directions  to  such  rising 
inland  towns  as  Johannesburg,  Pretoria,  and  Kimberley,  these 
places  became  strategic  points  to  occupy;  the  gospel,  if  preached 
there,  would  be  carried  to  kraals  and  districts  unreached  by 
any  other  means.  In  1894  Mr.  Goodenough  began  work  in 
Johannesburg,  securing  a  little  chapel  as  a  location.  The 
Zulus  were  delighted  at  having  someone  come  to  them  who 
could  speak  their  language;  the  opportunity  was  at  once 
found  to  be  needy  and  full  of  promise. 

Other  signs  of  growth  and  improvement  were  being  mani- 
fested, such  as  increasing  habits  of  industry  stimulated  by 
Other  the  expanding  wants  of  the  people,  the  impulse  of 

Signs  of  the  natives  themselves  to  carry  the  gospel  to  points 
Growth  yet  unreached,  the  diminishing  need  of  foreign 
supervision  in  the  mission,  the  better  work  of  teachers  as  a 
result  of  more  careful  training  in  the  higher  schools,  and  the 


SOUTHERN  AND   CENTRAL  AFRICA  429 

opening  of  some  new  lines  of  work,  like  the  home  for  native 
girls  at  Durban,  and  the  dispensary,  and  small  building  used 
for  hospital  purposes  at  Amanzimtoti.  Continued  revivals, 
notably  in  1897,  produced  some  remarkable  transformations  in 
individual  character  and  in  the  Christian  zeal  of  the  churches. 
It  was  apparent  that  the  Zulu  who  had  seemed  so  stolid,  carnal, 
and  indolent  was  at  last  awaking  to  a  new  sense  of  capacity 
and  ambition.  The  missionaries  remarked  with  delight  char- 
acteristic signs  of  the  times:  a  Zulu  actually  traveling  afoot 
while  his  wife  rode  the  horse  he  led;  a  troop  from  a  mission 
school  making  a  concert  tour  and  finding  appreciative  native 
audiences;  one  mission  school  challenging  another  forty  miles 
away  to  a  match  game  of  football.  And  there  were  more 
important  indications  of  the  same  awakening.  The  Zulu  was 
now  becoming  desirous  of  assuming  responsibility  and  self- 
direction  in  church  affairs,  in  educational  matters,  and  in 
political  hfe.  Church  councils,  conferences,  teachers'  insti- 
tutes, and  political  societies,  all  new  things  among  the  Zulus, 
were  significant  and  hopeful  facts. 

This  growing  spirit  of  self-reliance  produced  fresh  per- 
plexities and  difficulties.  As  in  other  mission  fields,  so  at 
Dangers  of  last  in  Africa,  the  native  Christians  began  to  claim 
Independ-  the  right  to  manage  their  own  institutions.  The 
ence  mission  recognized  with  joy  the  new  situation  and 

prepared  to  meet  it.  Yet  it  was  impossible  to  approve  or  to 
permit  all  the  hasty  schemes  of  independence  which  were 
then  pressed  and  for  which  the  people  were  clearly  unpre- 
pared. A  temporary  ahenation  of  some  native  leaders  fol- 
lowed, and  a  body  of  natives,  separating  themselves  from  the 
mission  churches,  formed  what  they  called  the  Zulu  Congre- 
gational Church.  The  spirit  of  patience  and  conciliation 
shown  by  the  missionaries  soon  overcame  this  hasty  action; 
the  separatist  Church  was  shortly  united  again  with  the  churches 
of  the  mission  under  the  new  name  of  the  African  Congrega- 
tional Church,  and  mutual  trust  and  good-will  were  restored. 


430  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

In  the  meantime  there  had  been  much  irritation  growing 
out  of  the  administration  of  the  Reserves  which,  as  has  here- 
tofore been  said,  were  given  to  the  American  Board  by  the 
government  in  order  that  the  mission  ''might  have  a  fixed 
population  to  labor  among,  without  let  or  hindrance."  The 
missionaries  were  obliged  to  administer  this  trust  by  assigning 
parcels  of  land  to  individuals,  thus  involving  themselves  in 
collection  of  rents  and  in  decisions  as  to  the  expenditure  of 
amounts  secured  from  taxes.  As  the  years  went  on  this  duty 
entailed  much  labor  and  many  perplexities,  since  the  natives 
beheved  that  the  Reserves  were  given  for  their  use  and  should 
be  conducted  as  they  individually  desired.  The  friction 
became  serious.  The  natives  demanded  that  the  land  should 
be  given  them  in  severalty,  a  procedure  which  the  government 
absolutely  refused  to  permit. 

As  the  mission  greatly  desired  to  be  relieved  from  the  respon- 
sibilities of  this  situation,  in  1903  a  plan  was  formed  to  turn 
over  to  the  Natal  government,  under  certain  fixed  conditions, 
the  direct  rule  of  the  Mission  Reserves.  If  the  government 
officials  had  acted  considerately  under  this  plan  serious  trouble 
might  have  been  avoided,  but  they  failed  to  handle  the  matter 
tactfully.  Rather,  becoming  alarmed  at  the  growing  spirit 
of  independence,  they  began  to  coerce  the  natives.  Exorbi- 
tant rents  were  charged,  native  ministers  were  denied  the 
right  to  celebrate  marriages,  and  it  was  declared  that  a  white 
missionary  must  reside  as  superintendent  wherever  there  was 
a  native  church.  All  this  resulted  badly  and  the  people 
became  still  more  apprehensive  and  dissatisfied,  while  the 
policy  of  the  government  grew  more  rigid. 

What  came  to  be  called  the  Ethiopian  Movement  was  at 
first  nowhere  disloyal  or  inciting  to  rebellion,  but  only  an 
assertion  of  the  desire  on  the  part  of  the  natives  for  larger 
liberties,  responsibilities,  and  opportunities.  At  length,  as  fric- 
tion increased,  this  uprising  came  to  seem  ominous,  not  only 
to  officials,  but  to  the  watchful  missionaries  who  were  in  the 


SOUTHERN  AND   CENTRAL  AFRICA  431 

delicate  and  difficult  position  of  trying  to  mediate  between 
two  parties,  with  the  contention  of  neither  of  whom  they 
could  altogether  agree. 

During  the  year  1903  the  Board's  first  deputation  to  Africa 
visited  all  the  stations  of  the  South  and  East  Central  Missions. 
The  Depu-  Mr.  F.  O.  Winslow  being  unable  to  accept  his 
tation's  appointment,  this  deputation  had  but  two  mem- 
Findings  bers.  Secretary  E.  E.  Strong  and  Sydney  Strong,  D.D. 
Happily  Mrs.  Sydney  Strong  was  able  to  accompany  the  party 
and  to  contribute  a  quick  appreciation,  sympathy,  and 
woman's  tact.  Her  sudden  sickness  and  death  on  the  home- 
ward voyage  enrolled  her  name  among  those  who  have  sacri- 
ficed their  lives  for  the  redemption  of  Africa. 

As  they  journeyed  from  place  to  place,  inspecting  institu- 
tions and  communities  of  the  Zulu  Mission,  the  deputation 
was  impressed  to  find  how  thoroughly  this  missionary  work 
was  being  wrought  into  the  people's  life.  Self-supporting 
churches  with  native  pastors  were  evangelizing  each  in  its 
own  vicinity;  the  schools,  too,  had  native  teachers  and  were 
included  in  the  school  system  of  the  colony.  The  missionary 
spirit  of  the  Zulu  church  was  now  very  strong  and  was  the 
best  buttress  against  formal  religion  and  a  relapse  into  heathen- 
ism. Their  gifts  to  home  and  foreign  missions  put  to  shame 
many  American  churches;  the  native  contributions  in  the 
Zulu  Mission  in  1903,  with  only  twenty-three  organized  churches 
and  4000  communicants,  were  about  $8000. 

Evangelism  was  easily  developed  among  the  Zulus;  men  took 
it  for  granted  that  they  were  to  proclaim  the  gospel  that  had 
come  to  them.  Every  Sunday  at  Durban  a  large  company 
of  lay  preachers  went  out  to  repeat  to  others  what  they  had 
that  day  heard.  Similar  work  was  done  elsewhere;  bands  of 
men  and  women  after  the  church  service  would  visit  the  kraals 
for  many  miles  around.  The  evangelizing  spirit  of  this  people 
is  well  shown  in  the  history  of  Engonyameni,  near  Delagoa 
Bay,  where  the  gospel  was  carried  somewhat  later  by  natives 


432  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

of  the  place  who  had  been  won  to  Christ  at  Pretoria,  more 
than  100  miles  away.  These  young  men,  on  returning  home, 
not  only  announced  their  conversion  and  preached  the  gospel 
to  their  people,  but  with  their  own  hands  built  chapels  until 
they  had  erected  seven,  which  became  centers  of  Christian 
teaching  and  fellowship.  When  Mr.  Goodenough  visited  that 
region  in  1905,  after  the  work  had  been  in  progress  some  two 
or  three  years,  he  could  hardly  trust  his  eyes,  declaring  it 
the  most  marvelous  bit  of  mission  work  he  had  seen  in  Africa. 
At  the  annual  meeting  of  the  native  churches  in  1907,  held  in 
Papala,  north  of  the  Tugela  River,  itself  typical  of  the  out- 
reaching  spirit  of  the  Zulu  churches,  in  response  to  an  appeal 
from  Engonyameni,  three  Natal  preachers,  all  men  of  high 
abiUty,  declared  their  willingness  to  go  into  that  fever-infested 
district. 

But  the  deputation's  visit  was  not  simply  a  joyous  inspec- 
tion of  the  mission's  successes.  There  were  still  problems  and 
difficulties  concerning  which  counsel  was  desired.  Some 
advance  in  the  educational  department  was  imperative  if 
native  leaders  were  to  be  provided  for  the  expanding  enter- 
prise. The  churches  asked  for  decisions  in  regard  to  polygamy, 
ecclesiastical  polity,  and  the  mutual  relations  of  the  mission 
and  the  churches.  And  everywhere  the  perplexing  subject 
of  the  Reserves  was  eagerly  discussed.  The  government 
flatly  refusing  to  permit  the  assignment  of  lands  in  freehold 
to  the  natives,  a  next  best  plan  was  proposed,  and  to  this  the 
people  strenuously  objected.  The  deputation  and  the  mis- 
sion came  to  be  looked  upon  with  some  suspicion  by  the  Zulus, 
because  wilhng  to  accept  conclusions  which,  though  not  by 
any  means  ideal,  were  regarded  as  the  best  that  could  be 
secured.  But  vigorous  protests  were  made  against  the  require- 
ment that  no  mission  work  should  be  conducted  except  where 
a  white  missionary  resided  as  superintendent,  and  against  the 
debarring  of  native  ministers  from  the  rights  and  responsibili- 
ties of  the  pastoral  office.     It  was  impossible  that  the  mission 


SOUTHERN  AND   CENTRAL  AFRICA  433 

should  develop  its  work  if  these  demands  of  the  government 
were  to  be  maintained. 

If  the  deputation  could  not  relieve  all  these  troubles  and 
perplexities,  it  could  encourage  with  its  sympathy  the  bur- 
dened missionaries  and  strengthen  the  loyalty  of  the  native 
Christians.  It  transpired  further  that,  by  the  courtesies  and 
hospitalities  of  the  time,  acquaintance  and  regard  for  the 
mission  and  its  work  were  increased  among  outsiders,  and 
some  high  govermiient  officials  were  led  to  consider  anew  their 
relations  to  the  mission  board  of  a  sister  nation  and  its  work 
in  their  land.  More  concrete  results  of  these  interviews  and 
deliberations  began  to  appear.  Educational  standards  were 
soon  after  raised  in  the  high  school  at  Amanzimtoti  and  in  the 
theological  school  of  the  mission,  to  which  Messrs.  Ransom 
and  Taylor  were  assigned.  The  primary  schools  now  began 
to  receive  government  grants  and  a  member  of  the  mission 
was  set  apart  for  the  general  oversight  of  the  educational 
work,  his  salary  and  traveling  expenses  being  met  by  the  gov- 
ernment. The  medical  work  of  the  mission  was  transferred 
from  Amanzimtoti  to  Durban. 

In  1906  an  armed  rebellion  was  started,  remote  from  any 

mission  station  and  imder  a  heathen  chief.     This  wave  of 

rebellion  spread  into  one  district,  where  it  touched 

T>  V  11-  two  or  three  of  the  Board's  stations.  Some  non- 
Rebellion      ^,    .    . 

Christians  and  a  few  church  members  in  two  sta- 
tions became  involved.  The  native  pastors  resisted  the 
uprising  manfully.  When  troops  arrived  to  disperse  the  rebels 
it  was  reported  to  the  governor  that  the  whole  population  was 
in  rebellion.  So  it  was  formally  charged  at  London  and 
announced  in  the  Parliamentary  Blue  Book  that  in  two  of 
our  large  mission  stations  practically  all  the  natives  had  joined 
the  rebels  in  the  field!  The  governor  of  the  colony  declared 
that  the  congregations  were  beyond  control  and  endangered 
the  government.  Afterward  these  statements  were  fully  dis- 
proved.    In  only  two  of  the  twenty-four  churches  was  there 


434  STORY   OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

any  disloyalty;  not  one  of  the  twenty-four  preachers  was  found 
wanting;  all  the  male  church  members  who  joined  the  rebels 
could  be  counted  on  the  fingers  of  two  hands.  Missionary 
work  was  really  a  support  rather  than  a  menace  to  the  govern- 
ment in  this  native  uprising.  But  for  a  time  it  further  sep- 
arated the  mission  and  the  Natal  government,  embittered  the 
natives,  and  made  harder  the  work.  Two  stations  at  Esidum- 
bini  and  Noodsberg  suffered  losses  and  were  involved  in  the 
sweeping  denunciations.  It  required  the  missionaries'  utmost 
courage  and  skill  to  hold  things  together,  keep  steadily  at 
their  appointed  tasks,  and  wait  for  better  times.  Meanwhile 
the  Board's  expanded  work  on  this  side  of  the  continent  was 
made  a  more  compact  organization  by  the  union  of  the  Zulu 
and  East  African  Missions,  in  1906,  as  the  Zulu  and  Rhodesian 
branches  of  the  South  African  iMission. 

The  better  situation  hoped  for  was  not  long  in  coming.  A 
new  governor  of  Natal  showed  a  friendly  and  conciliatory 
spirit  toward  both  the  natives  and  the  mission.  From  the 
first,  his  utterances  inspired  confidence  and  produced  a  calmer 
feeling  among  the  Zulus.  One  by  one  the  more  offensive  laws 
were  either  amiulled  or  relaxed,  the  Reserve  tax  being  greatly 
reduced;  the  natives  meanwhile  were  coming  to  a  fairer  atti- 
tude towards  government  control,  admitting  the  justice  of  a 
tax  if  it  were  not  excessive,  and  proving  to  the  satisfaction  of 
officials  their  loyal  and  law-abiding  purposes.  The  missionary 
situation  became  once  more  serene  and  hopeful.  The  forma- 
tion of  the  British  United  States  of  South  Africa,  in  1909, 
while  it  committed  the  injustice  of  disqualifjdng  natives  from 
voting,  yet  opened  to  them  advantages  in  the  field  of  education 
and  the  prospect  of  a  share  in  the  increased  prosperity  antici- 
pated from  the  union  of  the  states.  The  missionaries  report 
in  1910  that  the  conditions  of  missionary  work  are  now  in 
ever}'  way  happy  and  encouraging.  All  forces  are  working 
together  well  and  with  fine  promise  of  results.  At  the  very 
close  of  this  period  the  Zulu  Branch  of  the  Board's  South 


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SOUTHERN  AND   CENTRAL  AFRICA  435 

African  Mission  is  entering  into  cooperation  with  the  United 
Free  Church  of  Scotland  in  the  field  of  education,  an  arrange- 
ment by  which  the  youth  of  each  mission  will  be  educated  in 
the  Board's  school  at  Amanzimtoti,  while  the  theological 
students  get  their  training  at  the  Free  Church  Seminary  at 
Impolweni,  the  teaching  force  being  made  up  from  both  mis- 
sions. So  South  Africa  puts  itself  in  line  with  the  world  move- 
ment toward  union  on  the  mission  field. 

Throughout  their  tour  of  Gazaland,  or  Rhodesia,  as  it  was 
now  called,  the  deputation  was  impressed  with  how  much 
Progress  in  had  been  accomplished  by  this  mission  in  the  decade 
East  Cen-  since  its  organization,  especially  as  it  had  never 
tral  Africa  I^qqh  adequately  manned.  Despite  the  huge  task 
of  planting  this  mission  in  the  wilderness,  it  secured  results 
from  the  first.  At  the  beginning  of  the  third  year  of  occupa- 
tion the  missionaries  could  report  some  thirty  persons  as  having 
professed  their  desire  to  follow  Christ,  and  in  1897  the  first 
church  was  formed,  with  sixteen  young  people  as  its  members. 
Its  officers  were  from  its  own  number,  and  from  the  outset  it 
was  pledged  to  self-support;  its  first  contribution,  with  a  little 
aid  from  the  mission,  amounted  to  $11. 

While  all  departments  of  mission  work  were  undertaken, 
immediate  attention  was  given  to  industrial  features,  which, 
it  was  felt,  must  be  an  important  part  of  its  effort. 
Work  Soon  the  natives,  to  whom  all  but  the  rudest  tools 

were  a  mystery,  were  at  work  in  the  saw-pit  upon 
the  logs  hewn  from  the  noble  forest  at  Mt.  Silinda.  Shortly 
before  the  deputation's  visit  Mr.  Fuller  had  arrived,  bringing 
in  with  him  a  traction  engine  sent  from  this  country,  with 
much  other  valuable  apparatus  as  a  gift  for  the  industrial 
department.  The  transportation  of  that  engine  over  the  180 
miles  of  native  paths  leading  from  the  coast  to  Mt.  Silinda 
was  a  herculean  task,  requiring  weeks  of  time  and  all  the 
American  skill  and  Christian  devotion  of  Mr.  Fuller,  who 
simply  would  not  give  up.     All  the  industrial  lines  took   on 


436  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

new  activity.  At  the  sawmill,  the  brick  kiln,  and  later  the 
carpenter  shop,  young  men  were  taught  to  produce  building 
material  and  some  furniture,  both  for  mission  use  and  for 
sale  to  the  settlers.  Later  the  appearance  of  a  Ndau  hymn 
book  marked  the  operation  of  a  printing  press  as  another 
feature  in  the  industrial  life. 

In  1902  a  new  station  was  opened  at  Melsetter,  with  Miss 
Gilson  in  charge  of  a  school  for  children  of  Europeans,  which  the 
government  at  length  took  over  in  1910.  Among  the  students 
arriving  at  Mt.  Silinda  in  1906  was  a  group  of  young  men 
from  Beira,  where  a  station  had  been  opened  in  1904  as  the 
Ruth  Tracy  Strong  Mission.  Mr.  Bunker  had  secured  a 
residence,  was  gathering  scholars  and  inquirers  about  him  and 
making  a  good  start  at  mission  work,  when  the  interference  of 
Portuguese  officials  became  more  and  more  disturbing.  Boys 
were  seized,  imprisoned,  and  whipped  on  false  charges,  but 
really  because  they  resorted  to  the  missionary,  until  they 
were  almost  afraid  to  come,  and  the  situation  grew  intolerable. 
Finally,  worn  out  by  the  conflict,  Mr.  Bunker  felt  compelled 
to  withdraw,  closing  the  mission  temporarily,  but  not  without 
definite  fruitage  in  the  lives  of  these  young  men,  who  made 
their  way  secretly  to  Mt.  Silinda  to  enter  the  Christian 
schools  of  that  freer  country. 

The  wisdom  of  this  mission's  location  has  been  abundantly 
shown.  A  good  land  to  dwell  in,  it  has  proved  a  fruitful  land 
to  till.  When,  in  1906,  scarcely  seven  years  after 
o  tl  k  work  was  begun  at  Chikore,  the  third  annual  gather- 
ing of  native  Christians  convened  there,  it  was  an 
inspiring  and  rewarding  sight  for  those  who  founded  the  mis- 
sion to  see  this  living  church  bearing  the  witness  of  changed 
character,  offering  itself  anew  to  Christ,  and  responding  to 
the  appeals  for  service.  One  feature  of  the  occasion  was  the 
claiming  of  the  old  rain  tree,  under  which  sacrifices  had  been 
offered  by  the  witch  doctor  to  the  rain  gods,  as  henceforth 
to  be  one  of  the  possessions  of  Christ.     From  this  meeting. 


SOUTHERN  AND   CENTRAL  AFRICA  437 

and  moved  by  its  spirit,  the  Zulu  evangelists  set  themselves 
with  new  determination  toward  the  great  Sabi  valley  lying 
to  the  westward,  most  populous  of  all  the  adjacent  districts 
and  absolutely  dark  in  its  heathenism.  The  story  of  the  efforts 
of  these  evangelists  and  of  young  men  from  the  schools  who 
went  out  at  the  week-end  in  one  direction  and  another  to 
visit  the  heathen  kraals,  and  who  thus  succeeded  in  one  year 
in  winning  scores  of  such  as  they  themselves  had  been  to  follow 
them  in  their  new  way  of  life,  is  full  of  cheer  for  the  Chris- 
tian conquest  of  Africa.  The  Rhodesian  Branch  of  the  South 
African  Mission  faces  a  magnificent  opportunity,  with  every 
assurance  of  victory  if  only  it  shall  be  worthily  equipped  and 
sustained. 

Meanwhile  the  new  mission  on  the  west  coast  was  making 
headway.     By  1893,  when  the  East  Central  Mission  was  opened, 

three  stations  had  been  formed,  reaching  a  popula- 
Africa  ^^^^  ^^  100,000,  the  language  had  been  reduced  to 

written  form,  the  Scriptures  and  text-books  trans- 
lated, two  self-sustaining  mission  churches  organized,  with 
their  own  houses  of  worship  and  forty-nine  communicants; 
eight  common  schools  opened,  with  345  pupils,  one-third  girls, 
and  a  home  missionary  society  organized  and  at  work.  The 
task  had  been  enormous,  and  the  strain  severe;  of  thirty  mis- 
sionaries who  had  been  on  the  field  only  one-half  were  left 
in  Africa. 

Bailundu,    the    oldest    station,    naturally    showed    a    fuller 
development.     A    temporary    decline    had    occurred    at    this 

station,  with  some  loss  of  native  Christians  from 
Stations        ^^®  mission,  but  the  defection  was  overcome,  nearly 

all  who  had  relapsed  to  heathenism  had  returned  to 
their  Christian  habit  of  life,  and  congregations  were  larger 
than  ever.  Worship  was  maintained  at  several  places,  native 
Christians  sharing  in  its  conduct.  One  of  the  missionaries 
held  services  at  the  king's  village,  with  congregations  of  200. 
A  native  pastor  was  able  to  take  entire  charge  of  the  Sabbath 


438  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

services  for  part  of  the  year.  Schools  for  boys  and  girls  were 
flourishing,  village  schools  being  tributary  to  those  of  higher 
grade  at  the  stations;  some  of  the  more  advanced  pupils  in 
the  boys'  school  had  read  every  book  in  the  Bailundu  tongue; 
the  most  promising  were  beginning  to  be  taught  English.  It 
was  a  joy  to  watch  the  development  both  in  mind  and  heart 
of  some  of  these  eager  young  men  just  out  of  savagery. 

Chisamba  was  showing  the  benefit  of  the  ampler  support 
given  to  it  through  the  loyalty  of  the  Canadian  churches. 
Under  Mr.  Currie's  leadership,  work  at  this  station  developed 
strongly.  Organized  in  1888,  it  could  report  in  1896  that  no 
case  of  church  discipline  had  occurred,  the  examination  of 
candidates  being  entirely  in  the  hands  of  the  church.  The 
calendar  of  a  Sunday  at  this  station  showed  one  meeting  fol- 
lowing another  almost  without  intermission;  in  addition  to 
the  usual  preaching  services  and  Sunday-school  classes,  there 
were  early  morning  evangelistic  services,  conducted  by  native 
leaders,  and  attended  by  all  the  young  people  of  the  station, 
while  on  Sunday  afternoons  the  young  men  went  in  bands  to 
the  different  villages  to  repeat  the  message  of  the  day.  By  the 
time  the  new  century  opened,  the  church  attendance  at  Chi- 
samba was  seldom  less  than  400,  with  100  catechumens  under 
instruction;  the  witness  of  renewed  lives  was  everywhere  to 
be  found.  Some  stories,  like  that  of  Kanjundu,  the  Christian 
chief  of  Chiyuka,  deserve  place  among  the  heroic  tales  of 
missionary  history. 

The  growing  disposition  of  the  Portuguese  to  lay  firmer 
hands  upon  their  provinces,  together  with  their  jealousy  of 
Difficiilties  the  missionaries'  increasing  influence,  fomented 
with  the  trouble.  Assertion  of  Portuguese  authority  over 
Portuguese  the  kingdom  of  Bailundu  was  not  effected  without 
an  attempt  at  revolt,  which,  though  quickly  subdued,  occa- 
sioned violent  deeds  and  caused  a  temporary  check  to  the 
mission,  although  the  missionaries  themselves  suffered  no 
injury.     Yet  work  went  on,  increasing  in  amount  and  enlarging 


SOUTHERN  AND  CENTRAL  AFRICA  439 

in  scope.  Medical  and  industrial  features  soon  were  added, 
with  the  rudest  sort  of  outfit  at  first,  but  advancing  to  better 
accommodations  with  the  coming  of  missionaries  qualified  for 
these  tasks.  The  industrial  department  at  Bailundu  proved 
its  value,  as  the  young  men  became  able  to  do  most  of  the 
building  and  repairs,  work  in  the  shops,  at  the  printing  press, 
and  in  photography.  Two  new  stations  were  opened,  one  at 
Ochileso  and  the  other  at  Sachikela.  The  growing  disposition 
of  the  government  to  hinder  the  missionaries  showed  itself 
in  1908,  when,  as  Dr.  Stover  was  absent  on  furlough,  notice 
was  given  of  his  expulsion  on  a  trivial  and  unproved  charge. 
Many  traders,  also,  were  showing  their  dislike  to  having  mis- 
sionaries about.  Persistence  and  patient  effort  on  the  part 
of  Dr.  Stover,  who  remained  at  Lisbon  for  a  year  and  a  half 
awaiting  decision  on  his  appeal,  with  the  good  offices  of  the 
United  States  government  through  Minister  Bryan,  brought 
at  last,  in  January,  1910,  an  order  permitting  Dr.  Stover's 
return  to  the  mission.  The  victory  was  won,  not  simply  in 
this  particular  case,  but  for  all  the  Angola  missionaries  and 
for  the  security  of  their  interests.  Thus  on  the  west  as  on 
the  east  of  Africa  the  Board's  missions  come  to  the  centenary 
year  with  a  stronger  life  and  a  yet  brighter  outlook. 


Chapter   XXIV 

ISLANDS  OF  THE  PACIFIC 

It  is  significant  of  the  change  in  the  map  of  the  world  during 
the  last  century  that  within  its  time  four  lands  where  the 
,pj^g  Board  had  missions,  India  and  Ceylon,  Africa,  Micro- 

Islands  as  nesia,  and  the  Philippines,  became  the  possessions  of 
Colonial  Christian  powers.  In  all  this  transfer  of  territory 
Posses-  none  of  the  fields  was  more  disturbed  than  Micro- 
^^°^^  nesia.     As  the  Pacific* Ocean  became  of  larger  politi- 

cal and  commercial  importance,  colonial  ambitions  brought 
into  new  and  for  a  time  unhappy  prominence  these  ''pin-points 
of  creation,"  as  Mr.  Doane  called  the  ''little  islands." 

Fortunately  these  disturbances  did  not  come  in  the  first 
years  of  this  period  or  until  foundations  had  been  somewhat 
Quiet  firmly     laid.      The     early     '80s     saw     missionary 

Years  work  in  Micronesia  progressing  quietly  along  the 

Preceding  ^ew  lines  that  had  been  devised.  With  the  head- 
quarters, including  the  training-schools,  for  the  Gilbert  and 
Marshall  Islands  at  Kusaie  and  for  the  Carolines  at  Ponape, 
native  pastors  and  teachers  were  left  more  largely  in  charge 
of  operations  in  the  several  groups. 

Miss  Lillian  S.  Cathcart,  the  first  unmarried  woman  to  be 
sent  as  missionary  to  Micronesia,  came  to  Kusaie  in  1881 
and  Miss  J.  E.  Fletcher  to  Ponape  the  year  following;  there- 
upon woman's  special  effort  for  woman  was  fairly  under  way. 
The  groups  of  islands  were  now  regarded  virtually  as  separate 
missions,  since  in  language  and  customs  they  were  so  unlike. 
In  this  division  of  the  field  Mr.  Walkup  came  to  have  general 
supervision  of  the  Gilbert  Islands,  by  the  illness  and  enforced 

440 


ISLANDS  OF  THE  PACIFIC  441 

withdrawal  to  Honolulu  of  Mr.  Bingham;  Dr.  Pease  of  the 
Marshalls;  Messrs.  Sturges  and  Doane  of  the  work  at  Ponape, 
with  native  pastors  on  Pingelap  and  Mokil  in  the  eastern 
Carolines;  while  in  the  central  Carolines  the  new  enterprise 
in  the  Mortlocks  and  in  Truk  lagoon  was  in  charge  of  Mr. 
Logan,  with  headquarters  at  Truk.  The  annual  voyage  of  the 
Morning  Star  III  from  island  to  island,  and  group  to  group, 
starting  at  Kusaie,  was  the  one  opportunity  to  transfer  scholars 
and  locate  teachers,  to  convey  mission  supplies,  to  inspect 
work,  and  to  bear  for  a  few  hours,  or  at  best  a  few  days,  the 
cheer  of  Christian  sympathy.  The  vicissitudes  of  storm  and 
current  often  shortened  these  visits  and  sometimes  prevented 
them  altogether;  there  was  always  apprehension  that  the 
vessel  might  be  lost.  So,  indeed,  the  third  ship,  in  1883,  was 
driven  on  a  reef  at  Kusaie.  The  fourth  Star,  with  auxiliary 
steam  power  to  save  her  from  these  perils,  continued  in  service 
till  1900,  when  she  was  sold  to  avoid  heavy  repairs,  a  schooner 
being  secured  to  make  the  tour  of  the  islands  in  her  place  in 
1903.  Number  five,  a  small  steamer,  was  taken  out  in  1904, 
but  the  unexpected  cost  of  her  maintenance  at  length  made  it 
seem  unwise  to  keep  her  in  commission,  especially  as  the  growth 
of  trade  now  brought  more  vessels  to  these  islands.  Thus, 
in  1908,  this  last  Morning  Star  was  sent  to  the  United  States 
and  sold. 

Both  the  faithfulness  and  ability  of  many  of  the  Christian 
natives  left  in  charge  of  islands  were  remarkable  and  beautiful 
.  to  see;  Moses  and  his  wife  Zippora,  after  a  year  of 

Leadershio  ^^^^^^^  P^^^^  ^^  Truk,  during  which  they  kept  quietly 
at  their  task,  succeeded  in  establishing  a  school  and 
in  winning  some  hearers  and  inquirers.  When  the  Star  arrived, 
in  1880,  at  Apamama,  where  another  Moses  had  been  the 
teacher,  it  was  found  the  time  had  come  to  organize  a  church. 
The  Sunday  spent  there  was  a  day  long  to  be  remembered. 
After  continuous  examinations  by  the  missionary  through  the 
preceding  day  and  night  and  up  to  ten  o'clock  in  the  morning, 


442  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

all  went  to  church,  where  thirty-one  couples  were  united  in 
Christian  marriage,  seventy-one  candidates  for  church  mem- 
bership baptized  and  received,  two  deacons  chosen,  and  the 
Lord's  Supper  celebrated  for  the  first  time  on  the  island.  The 
congregation  numbered  200,  among  them  the  king,  who  would 
gladly  have  joined  also  ''if  his  fourteen  wives  had  not  stood 
in  the  way!" 

These  annual  tours  revealed  many  happy  surprises.  Mr. 
Rand,  comparing  the  conditions  with  what  he  observed  on  a 
similar  voyage  eight  years  before,  noted  great  gain.  On  one 
island,  Nonouti,  which  then  was  a  perfect  picture  of  heathenism, 
with  a  rabble  in  the  church  so  brutal  and  fierce  as  never  to 
be  forgotten,  there  was  now  a  quiet,  well-behaved  company, 
earnestly  listening  to  the  speaker  as  he  preached  to  them  the 
gospel.     It  seemed  as  if  it  could  not  be  the  same  race  of  beings. 

A  conspicuous  witness  to  the  worth  of  missionary  work  in 
these  little  islands  was  thrust  upon  the  world's  notice  in  1882, 
when  five  survivors  of  a  party  of  twelve  natives  of  Apamama 
were  rescued  from  their  cockleshell  of  a  canoe  600  miles  from 
home  on  the  open  sea.  For  six  weeks  they  had  been  knocked 
about  by  the  shifting  winds  of  a  monsoon,  with  only  a  httle 
pulverized  banana  for  food  and  a  small  supply  of  water.  "A 
more  devoted  band  of  Christians  I  never  met,"  said  the  captain 
who  found  them.  When  first  hauled  out  of  their  boat,  more 
dead  than  alive,  they  joined  their  leader  in  giving  thanks  to 
the  Almighty.  The  old  man  of  the  party  had  but  this  word 
of  English  to  utter,  while  pointing  to  himself  and  then  upward, 
*'Me  missionary." 

The  visits  of  the  Star  disclosed  other  than  cheering  condi- 
tions. The  same  year  that  the  church  was  organized  at  Apa- 
The  mama,  on  another  of  the  Gilberts,  Tapituea,  there 

Other  were    found    dreadful    conditions    of    warfare  and 

S^^®   .  reaction.     The  people  were  raving  against  mission- 

aries and  fighting  a  religious  war,  one  party  professedly  Chris- 
tian and  the  other  heathen.     Because  the  heathen  would  not 


ISLANDS   OF  THE  PACIFIC  443 

submit  to  be  taught,  but  chose  to  dance  and  carouse,  a  native 
Hawaiian  teacher  called  upon  his  followers  to  fight  the  enemies 
of  the  Lord.  In  the  battle  which  ensued  hundreds  of  men, 
women,  and  children  were  indiscriminately  slaughtered,  their 
bodies  then  being  burned.  The  missionaries  were  continually 
disappointed  and  chagrined  at  seeing  individuals  and  some- 
times entire  islands,  after  years  of  fairly  steady  growth,  sud- 
denly collapse  into  a  wild  orgy  of  heathenism.  Yet,  taking 
the  years  together,  it  was  certain  that  progress  was  being  made; 
despite  all,  there  were  numerous  shining  examples  of  trans- 
formed life  and  steady  and  disciplined  character. 

Considering  all  the  situation,  the  true  wonder  was  that  the 
lapses  from  Christian  life  were  not  greater  and  that  so  much 
was  being  accomplished  with  these  low  and  disadvantaged 
peoples. 

Chiefs  and  people  in  islands  not  yet  reached  were  now  calling 
for  teachers.  The  Morning  Star  was  continually  besieged  with 
In  New  such  appeals.  Even  Polowot,  in  the  western  Caro- 
Locations  lines,  whose  inhabitants  were  the  fierce  robbers  and 
and  in  Old  rovers  of  that  part  of  the  ocean,  was  seeking  teachers. 
Within  six  years  of  the  start  in  the  Truk  lagoon  four  islands 
already  had  churches  and  schools  with  native  leadership  and 
new  locations  were  opening. 

The  pressure  upon  the  insufficient  missionary  force  was  now 
very  heavy,  particularly  in  providing  for  the  schools  where 
there  was  utter  need  of  all  kinds  of  instruction.  In  the  train- 
ing-schools, both  for  young  men  and  for  young  women,  pupils 
were  taught  the  care  of  house  and  clothing,  the  preparation 
of  food,  and  some  farm  work,  the  school  farm  being  made  not 
only  a  means  of  education,  but  a  source  of  supply  for  the 
table.  By  1885  eighty  pupils  were  preparing  to  help  the 
people  of  their  races,  while  among  the  islands  some  forty 
day  schools,  taught  by  natives,  cared  for  2500  pupils.  In  the 
Gilberts  six  Hawaiian  missionaries,  appointed  and  supported 
by  the  Hawaiian  Evangelical  Association,  were  taking  most 


444  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

of  the  pastoral  care,  with  the  assistance  of  twelve  native  teach- 
ers trained  in  the  schools  at  Kusaie;  Mr.  Walkup  making 
yearly  visits  for  examination  and  counsel  and  to  transport 
pupils  to  and  from  the  training-school.  Of  the  Gilbert  Islands, 
nine  were  now  organized  with  Christian  institutions;  eight 
of  the  Marshall  Islands  were  similarly  occupied. 

The  American  Board  did  not  cease  its  concern  for  the  prog- 
ress of  Christianity  in  the  Sandwich  Islands  with  the  transfer 
The  of  its  interests  there  to  the  care  of  the  Hawaiian 

Hawaiian  Evangelical  Association  in  1863.  The  annual 
Islands  reports  still  summarized  the  progress  of  the  year  in 
Again  those  islands,  and  not  until  1871  was  the  mission 

spoken  of  as  fully  graduated.  In  1877  the  Hawaiian  Islands 
reappear  in  the  story  of  the  year.  Hawaii  had  become  the 
''crossroads  of  the  Pacific";  ships  and  traders  were  visiting  it 
in  increasing  numbers;  immigrants  were  pouring  in  to  become 
laborers  on  its  sugar  plantations.  Soon  there  were  more  Chi- 
nese in  the  islands  than  male  Hawaiians,  and  Japanese  were 
fast  arriving.  The  tendency  was  to  crush  out  both  morally 
and  industrially  the  more  indolent  and  unstable  natives.  So 
long  as  the  islands  were  isolated  and  life  was  simple,  the  means 
of  training  established  by  the  missionaries  sufficed.  If  the 
work  of  the  past  was  to  be  safeguarded  in  the  new  times  it 
was  necessary  to  reenforce  Christian  influences.  To  this  end 
the  theological  school  at  Honolulu  was  remodeled  and  the 
name  changed  to  the  North  Pacific  Institute,  of  which  Rev. 
Charles  M.  Hyde,  D.D.,  was  put  in  charge.  Its  aim  was  to 
prepare  Hawaiians  for  work  in  the  Gilberts,  to  train  a  more 
adequate  ministry  for  the  native  churches,  and  to  stimulate 
Christian  life  and  devotion. 

The  Board  now  undertook  the  partial  maintenance  of  this 
Institute  and,  with  the  same  object  in  view,  aided  the  board- 
ing-school for  boys  at  Hilo  while  contributing  also  toward  a 
special  mission  for  the  Chinese  in  the  islands,  undertaken  in 
1881  for  the  Hawaiian  Board  by  Rev.  F.  W.  Damon,  son  of 


ISLANDS  OF  THE  PACIFIC  445 

the  chaplain  of  the  Seaman's  Friend  Society  at  Honolulu. 
A  further  plan  to  send  out  from  this  country  general  mis- 
sionaries, each  to  take  a  separate  district  or  island  for  evan- 
gelistic work,  was  soon  abandoned.  Some  time  after  the 
beginning  of  efforts  for  the  Chinese  a  missionary  was  sent  to 
labor  among  the  Japanese,  this  task  falling  for  a  short  while 
into  the  competent  hands  of  Rev.  O.  H.  Gulick,  detailed  to  it 
in  1893  from  his  experience  in  the  Japan  Mission. 

In  stimulating  and  wisely  aiding  the  native  churches  of 
Hawaii,  the  children  of  missionaries,  many  of  them  engaged 
in  commercial  life  on  the  islands  and  interested  in  all  their 
best  welfare,  were  coming  to  bear  a  large  part.  Both  in  counsel 
and  in  gift  no  better  or  more  loyal  friends  of  the  American 
Board,  or  of  the  work  of  evangelizing  the  island  world,  have 
appeared  than  many  of  the  children  and  grandchildren  of  the 
early  missionaries  to  the  Sandwich  Islands. 

A  political  revolution,  after  various  shifts,  ended  in  the 
annexation  of  Hawaii  to  the  United  States  in  1898;  no  longer 
could  it  be  considered  foreign  missionary  ground.  Indeed,  one 
year  before  that  date  the  Board  was  able  to  withdraw  the 
last  item  of  its  aid,  the  grant  toward  the  North  Pacific  Insti- 
tute; by  1897  the  Hawaiian  Islands  as  a  mission  field  again 
disappeared  from  the  annual  reports  of  the  American  Board. 

In  1887  Spain  and  Germany  were  disputing  the  ownership 
of  the  Carolines.  Spain  claimed  them  by  right  of  discovery, 
Spanish  but  Germany  was  already  ruling  in  the  neighboring 
Oppression,  Marshall  group.  When  the  issue  was  referred  to 
1887-90  the  Pope  as  arbitrator,  he  decided  that  Spain  should 
have  the  Carolines,  but  left  the  Germans  in  possession  of  the 
Marshalls. 

The  missionaries  could  not  but  be  apprehensive,  as  Spain 
proceeded  to  take  firmer  hold  of  her  now  authorized  possession. 
In  March,  1887,  a  man-of-war  arrived  at  Ponape,  bringing  a 
governor  for  the  island,  six  priests,  fifty  soldiers,  and  twenty- 
five   convicts.     The   governor   made   fair   promises,    although 


446  STORY  OF  THE   AMERICAN  BOARD 

requiring  that  instruction  in  the  schools  should  now  be  given 
in  Spanish  and  that  there  should  be  no  antagonism  to  the 
Roman  Catholic  Church.  Almost  immediately,  however,  the 
demoralization  of  the  natives  was  begun  by  the  soldiery  and 
the  convicts,  who  also  encroached  upon  the  mission  premises 
and  interfered  with  their  affairs.  When  Mr.  Doane  ventured 
to  protest,  he  was  promptly  arrested  and  closely  confined  on 
board  the  Spanish  man-of-war;  after  two  months'  delay  he 
was  sent  as  a  prisoner  to  Manila.  Upon  prompt  action  by 
the  United  States  consul  at  Manila,  the  Ponape  governor  was 
recalled  and  a  Spanish  transport  restored  Mr.  Doane  to  full 
rights  and  privileges  on  the  island.  Meanwhile  the  natives 
had  revolted  against  the  intolerable  rule  of  the  tyrant  and 
had  nearly  annihilated  the  force  sent  against  them. 

The  return  of  Mr.  Doane  in  August,  1887,  the  coming  of  a 
new  governor  in  October  and  the  arrival  of  a  United  States 
vessel,  restored  order  and  gave  a  chance  for  the  reorganization 
of  missionary  work.  For  a  time  all  went  well.  But  later,  by  a 
breakdown  of  Mr.  Rand's  health,  due  to  the  strain  of  the  times, 
only  Miss  Palmer  and  a  trader's  widow,  who  was  aiding  in 
the  mission,  were  left  in  charge  on  the  island.  Encroachments 
and  outbreaks  were  renewed.  Upon  the  coming  of  the  Morning 
Star  to  relieve  the  ladies,  the  governor  accused  them  of  aiding 
in  resistance  to  authority,  and  ordered  them  off.  Work  was 
stopped  perforce,  and  the  Star  took  away  the  schoolgirls 
belonging  in  other  islands,  while  Miss  Palmer  and  Mrs.  Cole 
led  to  a  place  of  safety  the  Ponape  girls  whom  the  governor 
would  not  allow  to  leave  the  island.  The  empty  mission 
settlement  was  immediately  bombarded  and  the  buildings 
fired;  Mr.  Rand  was  confined  in  the  Spanish  colony;  the 
two  women  were  ordered  to  leave  Ponape.  The  arrival  of  a 
United  States  warship  brought  relief,  but  the  station  was 
necessarily  desolated,  only  a  few  natives  being  left  to  hold  the 
ground.  One  of  them,  writing  to  the  absent  missionaries, 
told  of  his  weeping  among  the  ashes  of  the  mission  church, 


ISLAISTDS  OF  THE  PACIFIC  447 

where  other  natives  who  were  wandering  about  joined  him, 
until  quite  a  number  gathered;  they  began  to  sing  and  pray 
together  till  everyone  broke  out  crying.  ''Of  the  many  trying 
years  in  the  Ponape  mission,"  wrote  Mr.  Rand,  ''this  has  been 
the  most  trying." 

Not  till  five  years  later,  in  1895,  was  an  indemnity  of  $17,000 
received  for  the  losses  and  injury  sustained  in  the  two  out- 
breaks of  1887  and  1890. 

Meanwhile  trial  and  testing  of  another  sort  had  come  in 
Truk,  where  the  Logans  had  been  toiling  at  their  lonely  and 
In  the  arduous  task.     In  the  care  of  the  five  stations  in 

Truk  this  lagoon,  besides  the  oversight  of  the  Mortlock 

Lagoon  Islands,  Mr.  Logan  was  obliged  to  make  long  and 
exposing  tours.  Much  of  his  traveling  had  to  be  done  in 
native  canoes,  picturesque,  indeed,  but  most  uncomfortable; 
pitching  up  and  do^vn  in  the  trough  of  the  sea,  in  constant 
danger  of  capsizing,  with  a  native  boy  acting  as  sliding  balance 
on  the  outrigger,  they  involved  an  experience  more  exciting 
than  restful.  If  the  voyage  lasted  over  night  there  was  only 
a  low  and  cramped  cabin  in  which  the  missionary  could  lie 
down  on  a  mat  to  catch  some  winks  of  sleep.  Yet  the  Logans 
did  not  quail  and,  in  spite  of  failing  strength,  toiled  on,  exam- 
ining, counseling,  and  directing  the  little  communities  com- 
mitted to  their  charge. 

Despite  many  trials  of  patience  and  disappointments  in 
individual  cases,  the  missionaries  did  not  lose  heart,  but  real- 
ized more  and  more  how  hard  was  the  struggle  against  the 
powers  of  evil  and  how  slight  and  unsteady  the  influences 
which  they  could  set  to  oppose  them.  "What  folly,"  says 
Mr.  Logan,  "to  expect  that  these  races  can  take  on  pure  morals 
and  Christian  civilization  in  a  few  years.  Souls  can  be  saved, 
morals  and  manners  improved,  and  the  seeds  of  all  progress 
planted  and  nourished;  but  the  century  plant  grows  quickly 
in  comparison  with  true  civihzation." 

Appalling  burdens  rested  on  this  devoted  missionary  as  on 


448  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

those  in  other  islands,  of  whom  he  is  representative.  He  must 
needs  get  time  to  translate  a  little  every  day;  to  administer 
medicine  so  far  as  possible  to  those  who  are  sick;  to  oversee  the 
raising  of  a  crop  of  taro,  that  an  entirely  unnecessary  famine 
may  be  avoided;  to  help  Mrs.  Logan  in  cutting  and  making 
clothes  for  the  fifty  or  more  for  whose  attire  they  were  respon- 
sible. When  the  Morning  Star  arrived  in  1887,  with  the  helpers 
so  long  sought,  it  was  too  late  to  save  the  exhausted  life,  which 
went  forth  from  this  world  in  December  of  that  year.  Without 
physician  or  relieving  medicines,  in  the  face  of  his  own  suffering 
and  of  the  anxiety  and  grief  of  his  wife,  Mr.  Logan  could  yet 
say  of  his  work,  '^  It  is  worth  all  we  are  giving  to  it ! "  "  Greater 
love  hath  no  man  than  this:"  that  he  lay  down  his  life! 

It  was  during  this  trial  that  the  veteran  Dr.  Pease,  still 
superintending  the  Marshall  Islands  from  Kusaie,  wrote:  "If 
The  missionaries  have  such  a  road  to  travel  as  Bunyan's 

Slough  of  Pilgrim,  I  think  our  mission  has  arrived  at  the 
Despond  Slough  of  Despond.  Mr.  Logan  gone;  the  mission- 
aries driven  from  Ponape;  the  Gilbert  Islands  Mission  without 
a  head;  and  the  prospect  is  that  the  Marshall  Islands  Mission 
will  be  in  a  like  condition  in  the  near  future;  if  these  people 
are  ever  to  have  the  Scriptures  in  their  own  tongue,  I  must 
devote  myself  to  translating,  and  who  is  to  take  my  place 
here?" 

In  the  Gilbert  Islands  field  the  death  of  Mrs.  Walkup  com- 
pelled the  closing  of  the  training-school  at  Kusaie  while  Mr. 
Walkup  brought  his  children  to  America  and  until  the  arrival 
of  the  Channons  in  1890.  Soon  after,  Mr.  Walkup  returned 
with  the  Hiram  Bingham,  henceforth  to  be  his  home  and  con- 
veyance, as  he  gave  himself  to  constant  touring  in  the  Gilbert 
group.  Dr.  Bingham's  Gilbertese  Bible,  which  he  began  in 
1859,  the  year  after  he  arrived  at  the  islands,  appeared  from 
the  press  in  1890,  when  this  field  was  more  strongly  equipped 
than  ever.  But  in  the  interruptions  the  Christian  fife  of  the 
natives  had  sagged,  and  the  transfer  of  the  group  to  Great 


ISLANDS  OF  THE  PACIFIC  449 

Britain  in  1892  for  a  while  worked  adversely.  The  first 
English  governor,  seeking  to  be  tolerant  in  his  rule,  unfairly- 
aided  the  scheme  of  the  French  Catholics,  and  so  temporized 
with  evil  customs  that  many  natives  turned  liberty  into  gross 
license.  The  next  governor  brought  a  firmer  hand;  at  length 
ground  was  recovered  and  schools  widely  established,  while 
Protestant  teachers  were  sought  for  all  the  islands. 

In  the  Marshall  group  practically  famine  conditions  existed 
on  some  of  the  islands  from  the  excessive  demands  of  rulers 
and  chiefs  upon  the  natives'  scanty  supplies.  The  question 
of  concern  was  always  the  personal  question  of  the  official. 
Here,  too,  a  new  governor  relieved  the  strain;  work  in  the 
Marshalls  straightway  began  to  show  splendid  results.  Unfor- 
tunately, his  stay  was  short,  and  his  successor  was  of  another 
temper. 

In  the  Carolines  the  missionaries,  banished  from  Ponape, 
found  a  temporary  dwelling-place  on  Mokil,  some  sixty  miles 
eastward,  where  the  natives,  who  had  learned  something  of 
Christianity  from  a  reformed  white  trader,  gave  them  welcome 
and  a  chance  to  work  until  they  should  be  able  to  reestablish 
themselves  on  Ponape.  But  before  that  time  came,  worn 
out  by  the  anxieties  and  disappointments,  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Rand 
and  Miss  Fletcher  were  obliged  to  return  to  America.  A 
tornado,  tearing  over  the  western  Carolines  in  1891,  wrought 
terrible  destruction  in  Kusaie.  Mission  property  was  destroyed 
or  badly  injured,  native  houses  demolished,  and  the  trees  on 
which  the  life  of  the  people  depended  were  mostly  overthrown. 
Following  the  supply  ship,  which  arrived  just  as  they  were 
on  the  brink  of  famine,  came  the  news  of  the  schooner  Robert 
W.  Logan,  commissioned  to  tour  in  the  Truk  lagoon  and  among 
the  Mortlocks,  and  bringing  sorely  needed  reenforcements. 
The  benefit  of  this  small  craft  was  great  while  it  lasted,  but 
she  was  lost  in  1893,  as  was  a  second  vessel  of  the  same  name 
in  1898. 

One  of  the  heaviest  trials  of  this  time  in  the  islands  was 


450  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

the  sense  of  isolation  which  rested  upon  all.  On  the  eve  of 
the  Spanish-American  War,  when  the  missionaries  knew  that 
something  was  happening,  they  were  left  long  in  ignorance  of 
what  it  was  and  of  how  it  was  to  eventuate.  During  that 
year  the  Morning  Star  could  not  make  her  usual  voyage; 
supplies  were  sent  down  by  a  neutral  ship.  A  Japanese  trad- 
ing vessel  brought  a  mail  to  Truk,  telling  of  the  war;  but  where 
was  the  Star?  and  what  would  happen  if  she  did  not  come? 
and  what  effect  was  the  war  to  have  on  the  future  of  these 
islands?  The  missionaries  could  not  even  communicate  with 
one  another;  word  was  sent  to  Truk  that  the  Spanish  governor 
had  forbidden  the  captain,  who  usually  brought  the  news,  to 
visit  them  or  to  give  any  reason  for  his  absence.  In  such 
darkness  and  uncertainty  they  struggled  on. 

The  war  between  the  United  States  and  Spain  revolutionized 
the  situation  in  Micronesia.  As  it  brought  to  this  country  a 
'Pljg  new  prestige   in   the  islands   of   the   Pacific,   so   it 

Spanish-  stripped  Spain  of  her  power  there.  In  the  Philip- 
American  pine  islands  and  in  Guam,  as  well  as  in  Hawaii, 
War,  1898  ^Yie  United  States  now  had  colonial  possessions. 
A  wide  door  of  influence  and  opportunity  was  opened  for  the 
mission  Board  representing  this  newly  dominating  power. 
Spain  now  sold  the  Caroline  Islands  to  Germany,  after  twelve 
years  of  bitter  tyranny,  and  the  Germans  took  possession,  amid 
great  rejoicing  of  the  people,  near  the  close  of  1899.  Henry 
Nanepei,  released  from  prison,  was  able  once  more  to  lead  his 
people  and  wrote,  in  behalf  of  350  faithful  Christians  on  Ponape, 
appealing  for  the  immediate  return  of  American  missionaries. 
The  way  was  open  for  the  renewal  of  work,  with  the  German 
governor  guaranteeing  religious  liberty  and  warning  those 
Spaniards  who  were  left  that  they  must  not  promote  religious 
strife.  After  nine  years  of  absence  the  Ponape  Mission  was 
reopened  in  1900,  the  missionaries  receiving  a  genuine  ovation 
from  Nanepei  and  his  fellow  Christians. 

In  all  the  groups  work  now  took  on  a  new  and  more  cour- 


ISLANDS  OF  THE  PACIFIC  451 

ageous  aspect.  The  German  government  proved  itself  friendly, 
though  requiring  the  use  of  the  German  language  and  indi- 
cating its  wish  that  German  missionaries  might  be  secured 
or  those  who  were  familiar  with  the  German  tongue.  The 
principal  Marshall  Islands,  all  the  Gilberts,  and  a  large  number 
of  the  eastern  Carolines  could  be  reported  as  occupied  by  the 
Board  in  1902.  A  religious  awakening  in  Kusaie  in  1902-03 
resulted  in  outwardly  Christianizing  that  island. 

An  event  of  the  war  with  Spain  that  seemed  almost  like  a 
bit  of  comic  opera  was  the  accidental  and  bloodless  capture 
Guam  by  a  United  States  vessel  of   the  little  island  of 

Opened  Guam  in  the  Marianas.  Whereupon  a  mission  of 
and  Closed  the  Board  was  opened  there  in  1900  by  the  transfer 
of  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Price  from  Truk,  Miss  Mary  A.  Channell 
joining  them  in  the  undertaking.  The  United  States  author- 
ities welcomed  the  missionaries  and  a  location  was  found  in 
some  of  the  old  Spanish  buildings  at  Agana.  In  1905,  after 
the  unavoidable  withdrawal  of  the  mission's  founder.  Rev. 
and  Mrs.  H.  E.  B.  Case  took  up  the  task  and  maintained  it 
during  the  succeeding  five  years.  They  found  the  natives  a 
simple  people,  speaking  the  Chamorro  language,  into  which 
portions  of  the  Bible  had  been  translated  and  by  means  of 
which  the  gospel  has  been  preached  to  whoever  would  listen. 
Some  converts  have  been  gathered;  some  schools  maintained. 
But  the  Roman  Catholic  influence  has  proved  very  strong,  and 
the  United  States  officials,  while  friendly,  have  not  rendered 
much  direct  assistance.  At  length  it  came  to  be  felt  that 
the  enterprise,  to  be  efficiently  conducted,  required  an  outlay 
in  life  and  effort  under  the  circumstances  hardly  justified. 
After  several  unsuccessful  negotiations  for  transfer  to  other 
Boards,  and  through  the  necessary  withdrawal  of  the  Cases 
in  1910,  the  mission  has  been  left  with  only  a  native  in  charge. 

Two  small  islands  of  Micronesia,  not  far  apart  though  in 
different  groups,  where  the  American  Board  has  missionaries, 
have  been  brousiht  somewhat  into  the  world's  notice  because 


452  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

of  the  discovery  on  them  of  rich  deposits  of  phosphate 
having  commercial  value.  At  Nauru,  or  Pleasant  Island,  be- 
Nauru  and  longing  with  the  Marshall  group,  though  widely 
Ocean  separated  from  it,  the  company  organized  to  work 

Island  these  deposits  has  opened  up  an  industry,  not  only 

for  the  1500  natives  living  there,  but  for  laborers  brought 
from  other  islands  and  other  lands.  The  managers  of  this 
English  company  have  shown  themselves  very  friendly  to 
mission  work  and  have  generously  helped  Mr.  and  Mrs. 
Delaporte,  notably  through  the  free  transportation  of  these 
first  missionaries  and  their  supplies.  Thus  within  seven  years 
the  enterprise  of  these  missionaries,  who  have  been  supported 
by  gifts  from  the  Central  Union  Church  of  Honolulu,  has 
developed  a  remarkable  mission  field,  having  substantial 
buildings,  including  churches,  schools,  and  mission  houses, 
with  congregations  and  schools  at  different  points  about  the 
island,  a  growing  literature  of  Scriptures  and  other  books,  a 
vigorous  and  influential,  if  compact,  mission  field,  which  is  full 
of  promise  for  the  people  of  several  races  crowded  together 
on  this  one  island.  The  other  of  these  fields  of  some  commer- 
cial importance  is  Ocean  Island  in  the  Gilberts,  where,  under 
somewhat  similar  conditions,  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Channon  are 
developing  the  new  headquarters  of  the  Gilbert  Islands  work, 
including  the  establishment  of  a  training-school,  in  which  a 
score  of  young  men  are  preparing  for  Christian  leadership  in 
their  native  islands. 

The  shifts  of  authority  in  Micronesia,  while  they  greatly 
cleared  the  sky  for  the  Board's  missions,  did  not  remove  all 
Obstacles  difficulties.  Another  and  fiercer  tornado,  in  1905, 
andOppor-  swept  Kusaie  almost  bare.  When  the  missionaries 
txmities  went  to  Ponape  they  found  the  case  still  worse 
there;  twenty  people  had  been  killed  and  nearly  400  in- 
jured. The  same  year  a  tidal  wave  in  the  Marshall  Islands 
caused  great  loss  of  life  and  property,  and  entailed  a  new 
burden  for  relief  and  encouragement  on  the  worn  missionaries. 


ISLANDS  OF  THE  PACIFIC  453 

Yet  more  serious  troubles  pressed  upon  them  here  and  there. 
In  the  Mortlocks  a  tidal  wave  of  heathenism  had  swept  over 
the  islands  in  1904,  almost  engulfing  the  Christian  communi- 
ties. The  stations  generally  abandoned  themselves  to  vice 
and  shame;  it  seemed  that  few  remained  true.  The  mission- 
aries had  fresh  occasion  to  remind  themselves  of  the  patience 
of  God  with  his  fickle  and  faltering  children. 

As  German  rule  in  the  Carolines  and  Marshalls  grew  firmer, 
it  became  clear  that  German  methods  and  ideals  of  missionary- 
undertaking  were  desired.  Also  the  awakening  missionary  zeal 
of  the  Christian  Endeavor  Societies  of  Germany  led  them  to 
seek  a  part  in  the  work  on  these  German  islands.  After 
repeated  overtures  from  this  German  Jugendbund,  and  upon 
careful  arrangement  with  them  and  with  the  Liebenzeller  Mis- 
sion, which  engaged  to  assume  the  responsibility  and  super- 
vision of  the  venture,  the  American  Board  transferred  to  them, 
in  1907,  its  interests  on  Ponape  and  Truk.  Ordained  German 
missionaries  are  already  conducting  with  good  success  all 
work  on  the  former  island  and  at  some  points  in  the  Truk 
lagoon.  Upon  the  arrival  of  certain  German  teachers,  in  1909, 
to  take  charge  of  the  girls'  school  at  Truk,  the  Misses  Baldwin 
who,  without  furlough  or  rehef,  had  maintained  it  against 
heavy  obstacles  for  eleven  strenuous  years,  were  able  to  with- 
draw. The  Germans  are  ambitious,  also,  to  take  over  the  work 
on  the  Marshall  Islands,  and  it  is  expected  that  as  soon  as  their 
resources  and  constituency  shall  have  somewhat  increased 
the  Board  will  transfer  to  them  also  its  undertaking  on  the 
islands  where  Dr.  and  Mrs.  Rife  are  now  the  sole  missionaries. 

The  close  of  this  period  brought  two  heavy  losses  to  the 
Gilbert  Islands,  following  closely  upon  the  jubilee  of  Christian 
work  in  this  group,  which  was  celebrated  with  a  joyous  and 
impressive  convocation  in  1908.  The  first  was  the  death  of 
Dr.  Hiram  Bingham,  the  closing  work  of  whose  fife,  the  Gil- 
bertese  Dictionary,  went  to  the  islands  on  the  Hiram  Bing- 
ham II,  which  Captain  Walkup  took  out  in  1908.    In  Brooklyn, 


454  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

at  the  annual  meeting  of  that  year,  Dr.  Bingham  had  de- 
clared that  he  was  still  under  orders  and  hopeful  of  going 
back  to  the  islands;  but  it  was  not  so  to  be,  for  within  a  few 
weeks  his  life  came  quickly  to  its  end.  A  second  affliction 
followed  in  the  loss  of  Captain  Walkup,  whose  word  was  trusted 
and  whose  will  was  law  to  multitudes  of  natives  whom  he 
knew  by  name  and  by  heart  through  all  the  Gilbert  group. 
Caught  in  a  sudden  squall,  the  Hiram  Bingham  II  was  over- 
turned on  May  4,  and  her  captain  with  his  eight  companions 
was  obhged  to  take  to  the  small  boat.  After  rowing  and 
drifting  for  twenty-two  days,  at  last  they  came  to  land,  but  too 
late  to  save  the  exhausted  life  of  the  heroic  missionary. 

In  the  enthusiasm  of  interest  in  the  Philippines  as  they 
became  a  new  possession  of  the  United  States,  and  with  an 
The  Mis-  encouraging  gift  from  an  individual  who  urged  that 
sion  to  the  the  Board  undertake  labor  in  that  great  field,  the 
Philippmes  latest  mission  of  the  Board  was  begun  in  1902. 
By  an  agreement  made  between  missionary  societies  to  prevent 
overlapping  of  work,  the  territory  assigned  to  the  American 
Board  for  evangelization  was  the  large  island  of  Mindanao, 
in  the  southern  part  of  the  group,  a  wild  and  unexplored  country 
containing  500,000  inhabitants,  fifty  per  cent  of  which  were 
nominally  Roman  Catholic,  thirty  per  cent  Mohammedan, 
the  rest  pure  pagan.  The  Moros  constituted  the  Mohamme- 
dans. The  pagans  were  found  to  be  of  a  raw  and  wild  type, 
presenting  a  new  and  astounding  race  of  people  to  be  citizens 
of  the  United  States.  As  in  the  earlier  missions  of  the  Board, 
the  first  attempt  in  this  field  was  in  the  way  of  investigation 
before  settling  definitely  locations  or  lines  of  effort.  The  first 
missionaries  were  Rev.  and  Mrs.  R.  F.  Black,  who  located 
at  Davao  in  1902.  Some  unpleasant  experiences  at  once  with 
Catholic  priests  indicated  that  care  was  necessary  in  making 
advances.  In  1908  Dr.  and  Mrs.  C.  T.  Sibley  were  sent  out, 
to  be  maintained  by  the  Mindanao  Medical  Association,  a 
company  of  gentlemen  in  New  York,  interested  in  contributing 


3  I  4  I  5  I  6  I  7  I  8~ 

20°      Longitude  East  from         Greeuwicli  124' 

^.«  ^  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

Babuyanes  *^  

Islands  ^.c:.       Q  MISSION   TO    THE 

..^CEngano  PHILIPPINES 

Station  :    •  Davao 
Out-station  s:%  Cagayan 


ISLANDS  OF  THE  PACIFIC  455 

to  the  development  of  this  phase  of  Christian  missions  in  the 
PhiHppines  and  desirous  of  operating  through  the  American 
Board. 

Further  exploration  and  closer  contact  with  the  people 
have  made  it  clear  that  the  American  Board  Mission  has  a 
splendid  field  to  cultivate  and  one  full  of  promise.  If  few 
results  have  as  yet  appeared,  they  are  significant.  A  church 
with  a  small  membership  has  been  formed  and  one  capable 
and  devoted  Filipino  evangeHst  has  been  found.  Already 
there  are  many  children  under  instruction,  the  Scriptures  have 
been  translated  into  the  dialect,  and  in  town  and  village,  as 
well  as  beyond  into  the  wilderness,  the  gospel  has  been  preached. 
The  Board  is  this  very  year  somewhat  enlarging  its  work,  in 
part  through  the  increasing  help  of  the  Medical  Association, 
by  the  commissioning  of  another  missionary  and  the  provision 
of  a  hospital  for  Dr.  Sibley's  important  department. 

A  sudden  riot  or  insurrection  in  the  early  summer  of  1909 
involved  the  missionaries  in  some  danger  for  a  few  days,  but 
they  escaped  injury,  and  the  disturbance  was  quieted  without 
much  interruption.  If  this  mission  of  the  American  Board 
has  been  a  little  slow  in  getting  under  way,  its  prospect  of 
efficiency  and  success  is  not  less  than  that  of  other  missions  in 
the  Philippines. 


Chapter  XXV 

IN  PAPAL  LANDS 

The  opening  of  the  third  period  of  the  Board's  century 
found  the  missions  in  Papal  Lands  scarcely  more  than  located. 
Creating  ^^  Mexico,  indeed,  a  new  start  was  necessary  after 
a  New  the  massacre;  in  Spain  and  Austria  the  first  churches 

Atmosphere  had  been  organized;  also  schools  and  other  agencies. 
These  missions  were  now  to  justify  their  undertaking  and  to 
show  their  real  value;  that  they  were  not  in  operation  simply 
to  make  converts  to  Protestantism,  but  to  stimulate  a  new 
spirit  of  religious  freedom  and  to  instil  evangelic  faith  in  lands 
where  Christianity  was  fettered.  For  in  these  fields  the 
record  is  mainly  one  of  a  slowly  changing  temper,  showing  its 
influence  not  immediately  or  chiefly  in  new  institutions,  but 
in  new  relationships  and  attitudes  within  the  established  order. 

Spain 

Acceptance  of  the  Protestant  faith  even  at  the  beginning 
of  this  period  involved  so  bitter  consequences  in  the  north 
Against  oi  Spain  that  many  withdrew  to  South  American 
Many  ports  to  avoid  persecution.     The  mother  church  at 

Adversities  Santander  was  thus  kept  one  of  the  smallest  in  the 
mission.  In  1881  the  station  and  Girls'  School  were  removed 
to  San  Sebastian,  nearer  the  border  of  France  and  on  a  through 
line  of  travel.  The  new  location  proved  to  be  a  more  con- 
venient and  favorable  center  for  missionary  work. 

The  removal  of  Rev.  T.  L.  Gulick  and  wife  because  of  the 
former's  ill  health  would  have  cut  in  two  the  small  mission 
force,  save  that  Mrs.  WilHam  H.  GuUck  had  secured  Miss 

456 


I  2  '.  3  .'  "^  '  ^         ,     I  V  '  J  ' 


Longitude      from     5'  Greenwich  West 

Bay    o !/'    B  i  s  c  a  y  n 


La  Coruna^ 


Gijon/ 


Finisterr'eU  • 


Santiago 


fBilbao^ 


Pau 


Burgos     ^^iHv  I  1     ^    S 


Braga  '.--ysflladolic 


Oporto 

^       »/       rr*  )    ^lamanci  (i® 


/Zaragoza 


Barcelona 


JJl 


Tortoaal^Tarragona 


C.R"oc3C5^>sbon 


,,.rt^< 


-'Tole'do/  lAranju^^ 
*>i     Alci 


Bada 


^      Evora  ,x  /_         ,,    - 


/Al 


Valencia     v      Maj 

d/lviza  T' 


^ 


^C- 5,,  ..Faro 


Pall 


:4^Sevilla^^^^,^Gra:nada  >^  Cartagepa  v 


'''"V„,,;,¥delaBUter 


i^lLj[!i!!!!>^'^    .     Vv  \he  American  Board 

'Malaga 


/^Gibraltar(J?'-j^)     ^     ^1 


Tangier/^''^CCfeuta  '^i'^'"' 


liiv'^^i!' 


MISSION  TO  SPAIN 

Stations :. 9  Madrid 
Out-Stations:. . .  e  Bilbao 
Railroads:  

50               100             150            200             250 
^      English  Statute  Miles 


10=        Eas 


^"^^ 


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^.  "V       ^((Ratibory 


The  American  Board 


.uawejK;^,ZnairtK    ^    s,.'/,       MISSION  TO  AUSTRIA 

^}-^^<ij^^-^^-<i^     (f  station:        aPrague 

OMf-Sfaf/o/JS;. . .  •  Lodz 

Railroads: 
Pressburg 


IN  PAPAL  LANDS  457 

Susie  F.  Richards  as  her  aid  in  the  care  of  the  important  Girls' 
School.  The  depletion  of  the  mission  compelled  the  closing  of 
the  training-school  for  preachers  at  Zaragoza,  which,  for  the 
lack  of  some  one  to  take  charge  of  it,  has  never  been  reopened. 
Yet,  in  spite  of  persecution  and  reduced  numbers,  advance  was 
made,  as  at  new  points  inquiry  and  interest  were  found;  thus 
the  province  of  Tarragona  was  entered  in  1882  at  the  request 
of  the  EvangeHcal  Society  of  Geneva,  and  with  the  commis- 
sioning of  two  Spanish  evangelists.  By  1884  a  dozen  out- 
stations  were  occupied. 

The  death  of  King  Alphonsus  XII  in  November,  1885,  was 
followed  by  a  more  liberal  pohcy,  which  allowed  greater  free- 
dom to  pastors  in  their  evangelistic  work.  A  harsh  law  against 
private  schools,  intended  to  close  those  of  the  mission,  was 
then  annulled.  The  troubles  in  the  Caroline  Islands  worked 
to  the  benefit  of  the  missionary  effort  in  Spain,  as  the  press 
in  general,  though  Roman  Catholic,  praised  the  conduct  of  the 
American  missionaries. 

Opposition  was  not  at  once  or  altogether  stayed.  In  Bilbao, 
one  of  the  most  liberal  cities,  so  late  as  1890  no  landlord  could 
be  found  who  would  rent  a  room  for  Protestant  worship  or  for 
a  school.  Yet,  on  the  whole,  the  way  was  opening  for  advance. 
Signs  that  the  new  teaching  was  making  itself  felt  were  con- 
tinually appearing  in  new  quarters,  as  at  Pau,  across  the 
border  in  southern  France,  where  there  were  many  Spanish 
people.  Mr.  Gulick  declared  in  1890  that  the  tourist  who 
should  look  in  upon  half  a  dozen  of  the  chapels  in  the  larger 
cities,  and  count  from  thirty  to  100  persons  in  attendance 
at  the  services,  would  be  wide  of  the  mark  if  he  should 
judge  that  he  had  seen  the  better  part  of  the  Protestant 
community  in  Spain.  The  chief  strength  of  it  did  not  lie 
in  organized  churches  or  in  the  schools  in  the  large  cities, 
l?ut  in  the  many  little  groups  of  evangelical  Christians,  with 
or  without  pastors,  scattered  far  and  wide  throughout  the 
country.     ''When  a  man  in  a  country  village,  who  has  been 


458  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

wasteful  and  quarrelsome  and  profane  and  a  gambler,  begins 
to  frequent  the  chapel,  leaves  his  former  associates,  is  seen 
coming  and  going  with  the  Protestants,  gives  up  his  worldly 
and  vicious  ways,  'joins  the  church'  in  public  confession  of 
his  faith,  bringing  with  him  his  wife  and  family,  and  becomes 
an  active  member  in  all  its  good  works  —  such  a  case  tells  as 
it  could  not  in  the  city.  And  especially  does  it  tell  when  for 
weeks  and  months  the  man  becomes  the  mark  for  the  priest, 
who,  failing  to  recover  him  to  his  flock  by  entreaties  and  blan- 
dishments, resorts  to  persecution,  such  as  only  a  village  priest 
can  devise  to  harass  and  injure  an  old-time  parishioner.  These 
cases  —  men  and  women  —  are  the  salt  of  the  church,  and 
accredit  Protestantism  throughout  the  districts  where  they 
are  known." 

But  the  spread  of  a  general  influence  was  not  all;  there  was 
a  steady  growth  in  organized  Protestantism.  In  1885  an 
alliance  of  the  six  churches  of  the  mission,  under  the  title  of 
Spanish  Evangelical  Union,  brought  a  new  sense  of  strength 
and  cooperation  to  these  young  churches.  By  that  time  the 
mission  had  become  so  well  established  and  recognized  that 
conflicts  with  the  civil  authorities  were  generally  escaped. 

While  it  was  not  necessary  to  undertake  in  Spain  some  lines 
of  missionary  effort  that  are  required  in  less  civilized  lands. 
Educational  and  while  it  was  agreed  that  the  Board  should  not 
Develop-  be  charged  here  with  the  expense  of  any  work  that 
ment  ^^s  not  definitely  evangelistic,  it  was  also  recognized 

that  Christian  education  was  an  essential  part  of  promoting 
evangelism  and  the  free  hfe  of  religion  in  Spain. 

From  its  beginning  special  interest  attached  to  the  Boarding 
School  for  Girls  at  San  Sebastian  with  which  Mrs.  Gulick's 
name  is  forever  associated.  The  success  of  this  school,  sup- 
ported by  the  Woman's  Board  of  Missions,  was  remarkable. 
It  was  soon  found  necessary  to  link  its  instruction  with  that 
of  the  national  system  of  education,  if  graduates  were  to  have 
standing  among  their  people.     Mrs.  Gulick,  therefore,  planned 


IN  PAPAL  LANDS  459 

a  five  years'  course  for  such  girls  as  would  present  themselves 
for  examination  at  the  Madrid  University.  The  sixteen  girls 
who  went  up  for  their  first  pubHc  examination  in  June,  1891, 
in  competition  with  300  young  men,  captured  all  the 
prizes.  In  1894,  when  four  girls  had  finished  the  five  years' 
course,  they  received  the  degree  of  B.A.  from  the  University, 
thus  establishing  both  their  own  capacity  for  higher  education 
and  the  competence  of  their  school. 

So  important  and  promising  became  this  special  field  of 
service  that  Mrs.  Gulick  undertook  the  task  of  enlarging  the 
school  and  of  securing  buildings  and  equipment  for  what  should 
be  a  permanent  and  commanding  institution  for  the  Christian 
higher  education  of  Spanish  young  women.  Accordingly,  in 
1892,  a  corporation  was  formed  under  the  laws  of  Massachu- 
setts to  hold  the  property  of  the  so  constituted  International 
Institute  for  Girls  in  Spain. 

The  war  between  Spain  and  the  United  States,  in  1898,  was 
a  testing  time  for  the  mission  and  for  all  Protestants  in  Spain. 
It  appeared  that  the  emergency  brought  courage  to 
^.  those  who  had  already  timidly  avowed  themselves 

as  Evangelicals  and  won  multitudes  of  new  friends 
who  had  been  slow  to  break  with  the  state  church.  While 
the  work  in  all  stations  was  somewhat  depressed,  so  that  the 
year  was  one  of  trial,  it  was  also  in  larger  measure  a  year  of 
triumph.  '^Not  a  friendship  has  been  broken,"  wrote  Mr. 
Gulick,  "not  an  unpleasant  word  has  been  spoken  or  written 
to  us  by  the  many  Spaniards  whom  we  count  among  our  friends." 
.  Upon  the  declaration  of  war  it  seemed  wise  to  transfer  the 
staff  of  American  missionaries  and  all  the  pupils  of  the  Inter- 
national Institute  across  the  frontier  to  Biarritz  in  southern 
France.  The  move  was  accompHshed  without  the  loss  of  a 
single  pupil,  without  objection  from  the  government  or  protest 
from  parents,  and  with  only  two  days'  interruption  in  the 
routine  of  the  school.  One  reason  for  this  surprising  escape 
from  ill  treatment  or  even  reproach  by  the  Spaniards  during 


460  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

the  excitement  of  war  times  was  doubtless  the  fact  that  during 
the  detention  of  Admiral  Cervera  with  a  host  of  Spanish  pris- 
oners at  Portsmouth,  New  Hampshire,  Mrs.  Gulick,  then  on 
furlough  in  the  United  States,  at  once  visited  them,  and  by 
her  knowledge  of  their  language,  her  grace  of  manner,  and 
warmth  of  affection  for  the  Spanish  people,  was  able  to  do 
them  kindnesses,  abundantly  reported  in  letters  sent  to  the 
homeland. 

For  five  years  Biarritz  was  thus  maintained  as  headquarters 
until  the  way  opened,  not  only  for  return  to  Spain,  but  for 
estabhshment  at  Madrid.  At  length  in  October,  1903,  an 
estate  being  secured  on  a  suitable  and  commanding  site,  and 
the  buildings  remodeled,  the  Institute  was  reestablished  at 
the  center  of  Spanish  life.  The  rejoicing  over  this  return  was 
clouded  by  the  fact  that  just  prior  to  it  the  body  of  Mrs.  Gulick, 
who  had  worn  herself  out  in  her  endeavors  for  the  school,  was 
carried  from  London  to  Madrid  to  find  its  last  resting-place 
near  the  new  home  of  the  Institute  which  was  to  be  her  monu- 
ment, and  for  whose  upbuilding  she  gave  her  life. 

The  success  of  this  school  was  recognized  as  marking  a  new 
era  in  the  history  of  Spain;  its  students  went  forth  as  con- 
scientious and  earnest  Christian  young  women  to  become 
influential  factors  in  the  remaking  of  Spanish  life  and  thought. 
It  is  estimated  that  not  less  than  15,000  children,  not  to  men- 
tion adults  who  have  been  taught  in  night  schools,  have  come 
under  the  instruction  and  influence  of  the  teachers  trained 
in  the  work  for  girls  in  the  Boarding  School  and  Institute. 
And  it  is  to  be  recognized  that  the  women  of  Spain  hold  the 
key  to  the  situation.  The  reason  why  at  Bilbao  the  mission- 
aries were  kept  seeking  for  four  years  to  secure  a  room  for  a 
chapel  was,  as  one  of  the  landlords  frankly  said,  "because  of 
the  women.  They  do  not  wish  to  be  undeceived.  If  we  should 
let  any  room  to  you,  they  would  make  us  so  miserable  with 
their  complaints  and  outcries  that  our  lives  would  not  be 
worth  living."     It  was  the  same  story  in  Madrid.     The  opposi- 


IN  PAPAL  LANDS  461 

tion  of  aristocratic  ladies,  with  the  powerful  influence  of  the 
Queen  Regent  behind  them,  even  so  late  as  1898,  and  despite 
the  upheaval  of  the  Spanish  War,  prevented  the  beginning  of 
Protestant  efforts  in  the  capital,  forcing  the  government  to 
violate  the  very  laws  it  sanctioned.  As  the  priests  ruled  the 
women  and  the  women  their  husbands,  it  came  to  pass  that 
the  priest  was  master  of  the  situation;  to  break  the  force  of 
his  domination  it  was  necessary  to  reach  the  womanhood  of 
Spain. 

Thus  by  the  twofold  agency  of  church  and  school,  always 
the  reliance  of  Protestantism,  the  kingdom  of  Spain  has  become 
Growth  of  slov/ly  permeated  with  a  new  spirit.  If  the  priest- 
Religious  hood  and  the  aristocracy  kept  a  tight  hold  in  the 
Freedom  metropolitan  districts,  yet,  as  one  of  the  most 
popular  Spanish  writers  of  the  present  day,  living  in  close 
proximity  to  the  American  Board's  mission  in  San  Sebastian, 
said  as  the  war  of  1898  was  breaking  out,  ''In  Spain  Protes- 
tantism is  getting  possession  of  the  provinces."  As  the  early 
fear  and  hatred  of  Protestants  passed  away,  even  Roman 
Catholic  parents  often  showed  a  decided  preference  for  mission 
schools  and  a  new  attitude  of  respect  and  even  regard  was 
shown,  sometimes  in  public  ways,  for  Protestants.  A  drama 
written  by  a  well-known  novelist  of  the  country,  about  1900, 
held  up  to  ridicule  the  spirit  of  ignorant  and  hypocritical 
fanaticism  and,  in  spite  of  clerical  anathemas,  overflowing 
audiences  applauded  it  to  the  echo.  Thus  in  the  midst  of  a 
growing  spirit  of  liberalism  the  evangelical  movement  pushed 
its  way. 

The  Christian  Endeavor  idea  caught  the  Spanish  heart. 
Forty-six  societies  existed  in  the  country  in  1904,  and  in  1908, 
when  the  third  national  convention  of  the  Christian  Endeavor 
societies  of  Spain  was  held  in  Barcelona,  no  Protestant  meeting- 
place  could  accommodate  the  delegates  who  filled  even  the 
large  theater  of  the  city,  as  they  came  from  fourteen  different 
provinces.     Mr.   Gulick    declared    that    no    such    evangelical 


462  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

meetings  had  been  held  in  Spain  since  the  days  of  the  Visi- 
goths in  the  fifth  century. 

In  1906,  as  the  scope  of  academic  work  in  the  International 
Institute  for  Girls  had  been  broadened,  new  courses  having 
j^Q  been  added  with  the  establishment  of  the  institu- 

Schools  tion  in  Madrid,  the  corporation  decided  to  take  into 
Instead  its  own  hands  the  management  of  the  collegiate 
of  One  course,  so  that  there  came  to  be  two  institutions, 

which,  though  continuing  on  the  same  location,  occupying 
jointly  a  part  of  the  buildings  and  conducting  some  exer- 
cises together,  were  yet  distinct  in  management  and  aim,  the 
Woman's  Board  yielding  to  the  Institute,  which  thus  took 
charge  of  the  higher  courses,  the  corporate  name,  while  adopt- 
ing for  its  own  school  the  descriptive  title  of  Normal  and 
Preparatory  School  for  Spanish  Girls.  This  separation  was 
made  complete  in  1910  by  the  removal  of  the  latter  school  to 
Barcelona. 

A  review  of  the  Board's  operations  in  Spain  during  this 
period,  though  not  presenting  many  startling  accomplish- 
In  One  ments,  is  altogether  inspiring  when  one  considers 
Genera-  the  situation  and  what  has  been  wrought,  the  intense 
tion  prejudice  of   Spain's  traditions,   the  power  of  her 

aristocracy  almost  altogether  arrayed  against  the  mission; 
withal,  the  ecclesiastical  authority  bitter  in  its  opposition,  and 
fighting  for  its  very  life  against  the  awakening  liberal  spirit 
in  the  nation  and  coming  to  be  reflected  in  the  government. 
Put  with  such  conditions  the  record  of  limited  equipment  with 
which  the  mission  has  carried  on  its  work:  throughout  most  of 
the  time  but  one  ordained  missionary  and  his  wife.  Dr.  and 
Mrs.  William  H.  Gulick,  with  a  few  unmarried  women  as  helpers 
in  the  teaching  force;  the  appropriations  of  the  Board  scarcely 
more  than  covering  the  maintenance  of  its  missionaries,  with 
added  sums  from  the  Woman's  Board  for  the  aiding  of  the 
higher  Girls'  School  and  of  some  schools  of  lower  grade;  yet 
this  little  company,  by  the  blessing  of  God,  has  been  able  to 


IN  PAPAL  LANDS  463 

render  an  immense  and  strategic  service  in  meeting  the  new 
spirit  of  civil  and  political  freedom  with  the  vision  of  religious 
liberty  and  evangelic  faith. 

Austria 

The  decade  beginning  with   1880  opened  auspiciously  for 
the  Board  in  Austria.     An  unjust  and  oppressive  law  which 
compelled   those   who   left   the   Roman   church   to 
Hand  ^^^^  their  children  baptized  by  the  priest  was  then 

annulled.  Moreover,  permission  was  now  given  to 
the  evangelical  community  to  form  a  verein,  or  union,  which 
might  secure  a  hall  for  religious  services.  Through  the  Verein 
Betanie  thus  organized  to  hold  Bible  lectures,  evangelical 
Christians  in  Bohemia  could  do  many  things  as  a  religious 
body  which  they  could  not  yet  do  as  a  church.  Local  author- 
ities also  in  many  places  were  becoming  more  friendly  and  in 
some  cases  willing  to  recognize  on  official  documents  the  Free 
Reformed  Church  of  Austria.  In  spite  of  occasional  inter- 
ference, ground  was  being  gained  each  year. 

After  all,  the  heaviest  difficulty  came  from  the  depleting  of 
the  mission.  The  withdrawal  of  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Adams,  who 
felt  compelled  to  return  to  the  United  States  in  1882,  together  - 
with  that  of  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Schauffler  the  year  following,  because 
of  Mrs.  Schaufller's  ill  health,  left  Mr.  Clark,  in  the  fresh 
bereavement  of  his  own  home,  the  only  missionary  on  the 
field.  While  the  mission  was  thus  desperately  straitened. 
Christian  work  in  the  United  States  became  the  gainer,  as  Mr. 
Schauffler  was  made  the  effective  superintendent  of  the  Con- 
gregational Home  Missionary  Society's  work  for  the  Slavs, 
and  Mr.  Adams  and  his  family  rendered  similar  service  to  the 
Bohemian  population  of  Chicago.  From  that  time  on,  the 
reflex  influence  of  the  Austrian  Mission  upon  the  immigrant 
problems  of  the  United  States  has  been  close  and  helpful. 

Mr.   Clark,  thus  left  alone,  was  happily  able  to  make  his 
home  with  Dr.  and  Mrs.  H.  S.  Pomeroy,  who  became  also 


464  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

colaborers  for  a  while  during  their  residence  in  Prague,  and 
who,  during  the  absence  of  Mr.  Clark  in  1884,  were  ready  to 
take  entire  charge  of  the  mission.  Not  only  reduced  forces, 
but  also  reduced  grants  from  the  Board's  scanty  treasury, 
compelled  a  restricted  undertaking.  ''Work  does  not  break 
men  down,"  protested  the  missionaries,  "half  so  rapidly  as  the 
cutting  down  of  estimates." 

Freed  from  the  necessity  of  providing  some  usual  depart- 
ments of  mission  activity,  the  Board  was  able  in  Austria  to 
give  especial  attention  to  promoting  Christian  liter- 

p     tiing     Q^^yj^Q     ^  there  were  still  difficulties  in  the  way 
the  Gospel       .        ,  ,.  ,...,,.. 

of  pubhc  meetmgs  and  mstitutional  religion,  it  was 

the  more  urgent  to  distribute  the  printed  Word,  and  the  col- 
porter  became  an  important  adjunct  of  this  mission.  Great 
care  had  to  be  taken  even  in  this  quiet  method  of  publishing 
the  gospel,  as  petty  officials  were  often  ready  to  arrest  a  zealous 
colporter,  and  persecution  even  to  the  point  of  violence  was 
not  unlikely.  The  mission  newspaper,  Betanie,  and  other 
publications  were  distributed  by  the  tens  of  thousands,  carry- 
ing their  message  not  only  through  Bohemia,  but  oversea 
to  such  cities  as  Chicago  and  Cleveland.  Book  stores  at 
Prague  and  Gratz  were  important  distributing  centers.  Sun- 
day-school lesson  papers  found  a  ready  market,  and  the  post- 
office  became  a  missionary  agency,  as  friends  in  Great  Britain 
and  Germany  made  use  of  it  in  spreading  Christian  literature. 
It  was  also  arranged  that  Bohemian  emigrants  on  their  way 
to  America  should  be  furnished  before  they  embarked  with  a 
Testament  and  some  other  religious  reading. 

Another  way  of  obtaining  indirectly  what  could  not  be 
accomplished  by  open  approach  appeared  with  the  Young 
Some  Men's  Christian  Associations,  the  first  of  which  was 

Allies  and  founded  in  Prague  in  1886  with  seventy  members. 
Alleviations  Even  this  unecclesiastical  organization  was  with 
difficulty  got  under  way.  But  immediately  it  proved  so  suc- 
cessful that  others  were  established  until,  by  1907,  there  were 


IN  PAPAL  LANDS  465 

sixteen  of  these  associations.  A  Young  Women's  Christian 
Association  was  ventured  upon  in  1898,  and  such  schools  as 
the  Krabschitz  Institute  for  girls,  the  Evangelists'  School,  and 
the  Briinn  Home  for  training  young  women  for  teachers  and 
Christian  workers,  all  under  the  care  of  native  evangehcal 
pastors,  were  closely  associated  with  the  mission.  Mrs.  Clark 
was  instrumental  in  the  opening  in  Prague  of  a  Rescue  Reform 
Home  for  women,  the  only  one  of  its  kind  in  that  part  of  Europe, 
meeting  a  terrible  need  of  Austrian  life. 

By  1890  it  was  plain  that  greater  freedom  for  work  had 
come.  Opposition  was  not  ended;  a  petition  was  circulated 
in  1888  to  have  the  parliament  in  Vienna  put  a  stop  to  mis- 
sionary work.  But  so  wisely  had  foundations  been  laid  that 
no  local  interference  was  now  attempted.  Religious  meetings 
still  had  to  be  of  private  character;  those  who  attended  them 
came  by  invitation;  children  of  school  age  were  excluded. 
Yet  some  rights  had  been  secured,  as  by  a  bill  which  allowed 
the  securing  of  houses  in  Prague  or  anywhere  in  Bohemia  for 
Bible  study  and  Christian  worship.  Young  Men's  Christian 
Associations,  also,  could  be  established  wherever  ten  suitable 
young  men  could  be  found  to  petition  for  them.  Where  the 
missionaries  were  best  known  nearly  all  that  they  asked  for 
was  now  uniformly  granted  them  by  the  officials. 

In  1891  Rev.  John  S.  Porter  was  added  to  the  mission, 
a  welcome  arrival  to  the  Clarks,  who  had  held  the  ground 
Some  alone  for  a  decade,  and  making  possible  entrance  into 

Enlarge-  a  new  field  in  Moravia.  From  this  time  on  the 
ments  growth  became  more  rapid  and  substantial.     Prague 

was  still  the  only  station  and  the  center  of  all  the  work,  but 
there  were  thirty  outstations,  including  those  in  its  suburbs. 
Some  of  these  outstations,  like  Pilsen  in  western  Bohemia,  soon 
became  very  influential.  At  Husinetz,  the  birthplace  of  John 
Huss,  the  new  chapel  was  located  in  the  very  garden  of  his 
boyhood  home.  In  this  village  but  a  little  while  before  hardly 
a  Bible  could  be  found,  and  the  officials,  angered  at  the  return 


466  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

of  Protestantism,  posted  policemen  with  guns  and  bayonets 
in  front  of  the  home  of  the  native  teacher  to  keep  all  but 
members  of  the  church  from  attending  services. 

A  mission  in  three  provinces  of  southern  Bohemia,  which 
had  been  supported  by  a  zealous  Scotchman,  upon  the  death 
of  its  superintendent  was  transferred  to  the  American  Board 
as  the  Alpine  Mission.  An  eager  call  from  Hungary  and  the 
opportune  return  of  two  Slovaks  from  America  led  in  1895 
to  the  entering  of  that  field. 

There  were  now  many  more  opportunities  for  work  than 
could  be  met  and  the  resources  of  men  and  money  were  heavily 
overtaxed.  The  service  of  the  Bohemian  pastors  was  most 
encouraging  to  the  missionaries  and  showed  them  to  be  not 
only  able  but  faithful  men,  wise  and  efficient  in  their  ministry. 
Characteristic  of  another  line  of  help  was  the  gift  of  a  liberal 
Scotch  friend,  which  secured  a  building  for  the  Young  Men's 
Christian  Association  in  Vienna  in  1900,  and  also  a  dwelling 
for  a  teacher.  If  it  had  not  been  for  these  benefactors  and 
helpers  coming  from  outside  the  Board,  a  large  share  of  what 
was  being  accomplished  would  have  been  impossible.  The 
Los  von  Rom  movement,  as  it  was  called,  though  largely  political 
in  its  origin  and  course  and  tending  rather  to  infidelity  than 
to  faith,  yet  made  accessible  a  multitude  who  a  few  years 
earlier  would  have  been  unwilling  to  listen  to  any  Protestant 
teaching. 

It  was  marvelous  how  the  seed  was  carried  in  all  directions 
from  that  single  center  of  Prague.  A  striking  instance  of 
On  the  the  sort  appeared  in  the  founding  of  a  new  congre- 
Wings  of  gation  soon  after  1900  at  the  city  of  Lodz,  in  Russian 
the  Wmd  Poland,  where  had  gone  a  young  man  connected  with 
the  Board's  mission,  as  clerk  for  a  business  house.  Finding 
himself  in  the  midst  of  a  population  of  200,000  Bohemians, 
he  began  by  inviting  some  of  his  fellow  clerks  to  his  room  on 
Sunday  to  sing  Christian  hymns  in  their  own  tongue.  Little 
by  little,  friends  came  with  them  until  a  deep  religious  interest 


IN  PAPAL  LANDS  467 

was  awakened.  In  1902  a  church  was  organized,  at  first  sup- 
ported mainly  by  evangeUcal  Christians  in  St.  Petersburg.  It 
was  distinctively  a  church  of  young  men,  with  a  Y.  M.  C.  A. 
worker  from  Prague  as  their  first  pastor.  Other  congregations 
followed,  a  second  church  was  organized,  a  Protestant  head- 
quarters secured,  with  a  little  timely  aid  from  the  American 
Board,  and  thus  a  new  and  independent  center  of  evangelistic 
life  was  established  in  Russia. 

In  the  same  way  churches  were  formed  in  the  city  of  Vienna; 
one  in  Hungary,  near  the  Servian  frontier;  one  in  Brlinn,  in 
Moravia;  several  at  other  important  centers.  It  is  this  scat- 
tering abroad  which  is  spreading  the  gospel  quickly  and  effect- 
ively through  all  the  empire  and,  indeed,  in  the  lands  beyond. 
And  the  work  has  not  been  killed  at  the  center  by  this  quick 
outbranching.  It  is  now  housed  in  a  new  Gospel  Hall,  costing 
some  $20,000,  adequate  not  only  for  church  services,  but  for 
the  work  of  the  important  Y.  M.  C.  A.,  the  gift,  not  of  the 
American  Board  or  of  friends  in  this  country,  but  of  one  who 
has  watched  and  loyally  aided  the  work  from  Scotland.  And 
its  constituency,  if  kept  fewer  in  numbers  by  the  removals, 
is  alert  and  zealous.  For  in  Austria  not  only  pastors  and 
missionaries,  but  church  members,  count  themselves  to  be 
messengers  of  light  to  others.  Here,  also,  the  Christian 
Endeavor  Society  has  been  a  fruitful  influence  in  the]  church 
life;  its  members  have  interpreted  their  pledge  as  calling  them 
to  win  others  to  Christ,  and  have  made  systematic  and  even 
house-to-house  canvasses  among  their  acquaintances  and 
friends  on  the  errand  of  the  gospel. 

The  work  of  the  missionaries  is  now  largely  that  of  counsel 
and  inspiration,  as  the  twenty-four  churches  of  this  mission 
have  arranged  to  push  the  evangelization  of  their  land,  revising 
their  confession  of  faith  and  preparing  rules  for  formal  organ- 
ization. And  scattered  over  the  field  are  no  less  than  thirty 
colporter  evangelists,  the  number  having  been  greatly  increased 
by  the  action  of  the  National  Bible  Society  of  Scotland,  which 


468  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

was  aided  for  some  time  in  its  operations  by  Dr.  Clark,  and 
at  length  put  into  his  hands  the  direction  of  all  its  colporters, 
with  their  extensive  work  of  distributing  the  Scriptures  and 
Christian  Uterature  through  Bohemia,  Moravia,  and  South 
Austria. 

Thus  within  a  generation,  in  the  face  of  intense  opposition 
and  carrying  what  seemed  crushing  burdens  of  depleted  ranks 
and  reduced  grants,  this  indomitable  mission  has  worked  its 
way  to  a  strong  and  effective  establishment.  The  mother 
church  at  Prague  reached  self-support  in  1894;  its  devotion 
and  generosity  have  since  been  developed  by  large  gifts,  not 
only  to  new  fields  in  its  own  empire,  but  to  the  support  of  a 
missionary  in  China.  When  Mr.  Adams  preached  his  first 
sermon  in  Prague,  he  faced  but  a  few  people,  gathered  with 
hesitancy  and  by  invitation,  m  his  own  parlor.  In  returning 
there  on  a  visit  in  1899  he  preached  to  three  crowded  congre- 
gations, a  striking  witness  to  the  change  which  had  been 
wrought. 

Meodco 

The  American  Board  has  not  been  accustomed  to  abandon 
missions  because  of  persecution  or  even  of  massacres.  The 
Reorgani-  assassination  of  Mr.  Stephens,  though  temporarily 
zation  and  disturbing,  did  not  shake  its  purpose  to  take  part 
Advance  in  the  evangelizing  of  Mexico.  In  1882,  the  same 
year  in  which  the  Northern  Mexican  Mission  was  opened,  after 
earnest  effort  to  enlist  a  Mexican  band.  Rev.  and  Mrs.  M.  A. 
Crawford  were  sent  to  reorganize  what  was  then  the  Western 
Mexican  Mission  at  Guadalajara.  Reenforcements,  including 
the  Rowlands  and  the  Bissells,  followed  the  next  year.  Upon 
arrival  Mr.  Crawford  found  that  the  fruits  of  the  previous 
work  were  divided  between  an  independent  enterprise  of  Mr. 
Watkins  and  the  mission  of  the  Southern  Methodists,  and  as 
Mr.  Watkins,  though  no  longer  a  missionary  of  the  Board, 
continued  to  remain  in  the  field,  despite  all  efforts  to  act  in 


IN  PAPAL  LANDS  469 

peace  and  good-will  toward  these  other  brethren,  there  was 
some  friction  and  an  unhappy  division  of  the  small  Protestant 
community.  But  a  footing  was  secured  and  work  quietly 
and  tactfully  begun.  Little  by  little,  misunderstandings  were 
overcome,  good  feeling  and  even  cooperation  attained,  and 
the  field  was  amicably  shared  by  a  missionary  force,  none  too 
great  at  best  for  the  abundant  need  and  opportunity. 

The  new  stir  in  the  land  was  nowhere  more  manifest  than 
in  Guadalajara,  through  which  railway  lines  were  now  con- 
necting the  Gulf  and  the  Pacific,  St.  Louis,  and  the  City  of 
Mexico.  The  Mexican  government  was  in  full  sympathy  with 
all  movements  for  intellectual  as  for  commercial  and  material 
advance  and  was  prepared  to  protect  the  Protestant  mission- 
aries in  their  work.  The  situation  in  Mexico  was  quite  different 
in  this  respect  from  that  in  Spain  or  Austria.  Ignorance  and 
superstition  were  still  to  be  reckoned  with,  and  a  jealous  priest- 
hood was  prepared  to  resist  at  every  point,  yet  no  organized 
or  open  hostility  was  anticipated. 

There  were  the  usual  first  tasks:  to  find  locations;  to  learn 
the  language;  to  get  acquaintance  and  win  attention  and 
confidence.  The  aim  was  at  first  almost  entirely 
^   ,  evangelistic,   by  preaching  in  chapels  as  soon  as 

they  could  be  secured,  by  visits  in  the  homes,  by 
neighborhood  meetings,  and  by  distribution  of  papers  and 
tracts.  Fear  and  opposition  were  soon  aroused.  On  the 
front  of  some  houses,  even  of  the  well-to-do,  was  posted  the 
notice,  ''Praised  be  the  holy  name  of  Mary,  this  house  is 
Christian;  here  no  blaspheming  is  allowed."  The  priests 
threatened  with  excommunication  even  those  who  tarried  in 
the  street  to  listen  by  the  chapel  door. 

After  the  first  curiosity  wore  off  the  dead  formalism  of  the 
popular  reHgion  was  painfully  evident.  Though  glibly  pious, 
with  all  their  language  and  every  action  woven  in  with  reHgious 
forms,  the  Mexicans  seemed  to  have  lost  the  sense  of  religion. 
It  was  almost  impossible  to  inspire  with  reverence  people  who 


470  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

greeted  one  another  on  the  street  by  such  baptismal  names  as 
Trinity,  Conception,  Jesus,  Saviour.  Persecution  for  a  time 
increased  as  progress  was  made;  those  who  declared  themselves 
Protestants  at  once  lost  friends  and  patronage.  But  no  per- 
sonal violence  was  offered,  and  secret  friends  of  the  mission 
were  found  wherever  its  messengers  went. 

New  locations  were  undertaken  as  reenforcements  came;  in 
1884  the  important  city  of  Parral,  second  only  to  Chihuahua, 
in  northern  Mexico;  in  1886,  Hermosillo,  in  the  state  of  Sonora, 
on  the  Gulf  of  California,  destined  to  become  the  headquarters 
for  an  important  section;  Labaca,  near  Guadalajara,  was 
occupied  by  the  Bissells.  Native  preachers  were  beginning 
to  be  used,  and  Christians  in  the  little  churches  at  the  centers 
were  being  sent  out  for  village  work.  An  important  factor 
in  the  evangelistic  work  at  this  time  was  the  paper  called  El 
Testigo  (The  Witness),  which  later,  under  the  editorship  of 
Mr.  Rowland,  became  the  organ  of  the  Christian  Endeavor 
Society  in  Mexico,  when  that  organization  came  to  bless  mis- 
sionary work  in  this  land  also. 

Public  education  was  now  so  developed  in  Mexico  that  it 
was  not  necessary  for  the  mission  to  undertake  such  a  system 
Educational  of  schools  as  in  many  other  lands.  Yet  some  Chris- 
Develop-  tian  education  was  plainly  demanded,  as  the  state 
ment  schools  rigorously  excluded  all  rehgious  instruction, 

and  the  sentiment  of  the  people  was  quite  indifferent  to  it. 
A  day  school  was  in  operation  at  each  of  the  mission  centers 
by  1886,  under  native  instruction,  while  Mr.  Rowland  at 
Guadalajara  was  conducting  a  training-school  for  young  men, 
the  modest  beginning  of  a  theological  school. 

It  was  soon  clear  that  the  mission's  greatest  need  was  a 
native  agency  —  capable  preachers  and  teachers  to  carry  the 
spirit  and  knowledge  of  the  free  gospel  far  and  wide  from 
these  centers.  The  national  schools  could  not  furnish  the 
needed  training;  so  that  the  mission  was  compelled  to  establish 
some  higher  schools  of  its  own,  particularly  for  the  girls.     Miss 


IN  PAPAL  LANDS  471 

Haskins  soon  had  a  thriving  girls'  boarding-school  at  Guadala- 
jara (Instituto  Corona),  while  Mrs.  Eaton  was  maintaining 
one  for  girls  in  Chihuahua  (Colegio  Chihuahuense) ;  Miss  Pres- 
cott  also  enlarged  her  work  at  Parral  from  a  day  school  to 
one  of  higher  grade  (El  Progreso). 

The  important  event  of  1890  in  the  northern  section  was  the 
establishment,  with  the  New  West  Education  Commission, 
of  a  theological  training-school  at  Ciudad  Juarez,  just  across 
the  Rio  Grande  from  El  Paso,  and  under  the  charge  of  Rev. 
A.  C.  Wright.  Picked  men,  recommended  by  different  mis- 
sionaries, were  brought  here  from  all  parts  of  the  mission  for 
this  special  training.  As  the  necessities  of  the  case  required 
the  furnishing  of  preparatory  courses  for  boys  and  short  courses 
for  some  older  men  who  intended  to  go  out  as  evangelists, 
there  was  great  variety  in  the  ages  of  the  students  and  in  the 
character  of  their  studies.  To  encourage  self-help,  a  carpen- 
ter's shop  and  printing  press  were  added  to  the  equipment  and 
proved  so  valuable  that  they  became  fixtures,  the  only  features 
of  industrial  work  in  a  mission  which  otherwise  maintained 
simply  evangelistic  and  educational  departments.  In  1895  two 
of  the  graduates  came  back  to  the  training-school  to  take  the 
place  of  the  American  teachers.  Within  five  years  of  its 
founding,  nine  men  who  had  been  in  this  school  for  a  longer 
or  shorter  time  were  serving  acceptably  Mexican  congregations, 
and  students  during  their  course  were  acquiring  practical 
experience  in  evangelistic  work  by  visiting  jails,  selling  Chris- 
tian books,  preaching  on  the  streets,  and  bringing  people  to 
the  church  services  at  the  mission  center. 

The  union  of  the  Northern  and  Western  Mexican  Missions, 
Consolida-  i^  1891,  marks  the  beginning  of  what  maybe  called 
tion  and  the  building  period  of  the  mission.  New  churches 
Concentra-  were  being  organized  and  better  houses  of  worship 
^^^  constructed.    Two  commodious  and  attractive  build- 

ings had  been  dedicated ;  one  at  Chihuahua,  the  other  at  Gua- 
dalajara,   each  attracting  new  attention  to  Protestantism  in 


472  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

its  region.     In  general  a  more  substantial  and  thoroughgoing 
enterprise  was  emerging. 

There  was  no  attempt  to  increase  the  number  of  stations; 
from  seven  they  have  been  reduced  to  six  by  the  end  of  the 
period,  with  only  four  occupied  by  resident  missionaries.  The 
missionary  force  nimibers  two  less  now  than  then,  but  the 
native  preachers  and  teachers  have  increased  and  the  churches 
have  doubled  in  number,  advancing  from  eleven  to  twenty-two. 

Missionaries  were  now  busy  working  out  into  the  several 
states  in  which  the  stations  were  located,  opening  up  new 
points  and  new  lines  of  activity.  Educational  work  in  particu- 
lar was  demanding  increasing  attention.  In  1901  the  train- 
ing-school, for  some  time  occupying  the  buildings  of  the  Con- 
gregational Education  Society  in  El  Paso,  was  removed  to 
Guadalajara,  as  it  was  felt  that  the  location  on  the  northern 
border  of  the  repubUc  was  too  remote.  In  its  new  home  the 
school  opened  auspiciously  under  the  care  of  Messrs.  Howland 
and  Wright,  and  with  over  thirty  students  the  first  year. 
They  came  from  all  sections  of  the  republic,  some  young  men 
walking  nearly  1000  miles  in  order  to  fit  themselves  for 
Christian  work  among  their  own  people,  and  knowing  that 
the  school  was  not  free,  but  that  they  must  earn  their  way 
while  they  studied. 

The  girls'  boarding-schools  of  the  Woman's  Board  were  also 
at  this  time  enlarging  their  service,  and  the  common  schools 
were  proving  popular  with  the  Mexican  people,  parents 
in  many  cases  preferring  them  for  their  children  to  the  free 
government  schools. 

Although  with  the  beginning  of  the  new  century  the  mission 
was  so  depleted  by  sickness  that  it  was  difficult  to  maintain 
An  Out-  all  departments,  the  evangelistic  work  was  pressed 
reaching  by  the  zeal  of  native  Christians.  It  was  not  uncom- 
Mission  niQn  for  fifteen  or  twenty  young  Mexicans  to  go 
out  in  groups  for  Christian  service  in  the  regions  about  the 
stations.      Sunday-schools  and   Endeavor  societies  were  also 


IN  PAPAL  LANDS  473 

flourishing,  with  the  note  of  service  continually  emphasized. 
The  rapid  development  of  the  country  was  adding  at  once  to 
the  attractiveness  and  the  burden  of  this  mission  field. 

The  effect  of  the  war  with  Spain  in  its  bearing  upon  the 
American  Board's  work  was  perhaps  more  marked  in  Mexico 
than  in  Spain  itself,  inasmuch  as  opposition  was  aroused  to 
the  missionaries  and  furtively  stimulated  by  the  priests;  yet 
this  opposition  soon  passed  and  no  permanent  injury  was 
done  to  the  mission. 

New  regions  and  new  lines  of  work  were  continually  opening, 
as  in  the  district  round  Hermosillo.  In  1904  Mr.  Wagner  and 
a  native  assistant  held  services  in  twenty-five  towns,  ranging 
from  200  to  12,000  inhabitants;  the  missionary  himself  preached 
to  some  1200  in  these  meetings,  which  were  held  in  both  agri- 
cultural and  mining  towns.  It  transpired  that  this  mission 
in  Mexico,  supposed  at  the  start  to  be  simply  for  one  people, 
was  actually  to  extend  to  the  people  of  many  races.  Ameri- 
cans and  others  coming  into  the  country  for  commercial  pur- 
poses were  often  almost  unshepherded  by  any  religious  influ- 
ences. Many  of  these  foreigners  had  shown  great  kindness 
and  good-will  to  the  missionaries  as  they  met  them  on  tours, 
and  were  calling  for  English-speaking  pastors.  In  the  Mexican 
Sierra  region  in  Sonora,  out  from  Hermosillo,  access  was  got 
to  the  Indians,  the  aborigines  of  the  land,  a  race  that  had 
great  possibilities,  but  was  yet  scarcely  more  than  pagan, 
though  counted  as  Christian  through  some  contact  with  the 
Roman  Catholic  priests. 

A  surprising  development  of  the  war  in  the  Transvaal  was 
the  settlement  of  a  colony  of  the  defeated  Boers  about  fifty 
miles  from  Chihuahua,  where  they  urgently  asked  the  mission- 
aries to  secure  them  a  pastor.  Being  sturdy  Protestants,  they 
offered  not  only  a  new  opportunity  for  service,  but  a  new 
source  of  help  in  the  Christianization  of  the  land. 

A  token  of  the  progress  made  in  developing  a  native  evan- 
gelical Christianity  appeared  in  the  gathering  of  representative 


474  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

Mexican  pastors  with  the  missionaries  in  the  annual  meeting 
of  the  mission  in  1907  to  consider  with  them  all  plans  and 
questions  affecting  their  common  interests.  Moreover,  the 
churches  were  urged  to  form  associations  by  which  they  should 
be  more  closely  united  and  prepared  for  cooperative  work. 
Upon  the  coming  to  self-support  of  some  of  the  larger  churches 
in  the  cities,  generous  giving  was  stimulated,  not  only  for  their 
own  needs,  but  for  the  work  of  extension. 

Liberalizing  tendencies  are  becoming  more  and  more  apparent 
in  Mexico.  The  missionaries  and  their  work  are  growing  in 
favor  with  all  classes;  they  are  recognized  as  bene- 
o  tl  k  factors  of  the  country.  Questions  concerning  the 
tenure  of  property,  a  somewhat  difficult  matter  in 
view  of  the  laws  of  the  republic,  have  been  solved  by  the  organ- 
izing of  a  ''holding  company,"  to  which  the  property  in  the 
various  stations  has  been  transferred.  While  it  is  still  slow 
work  to  break  over  tradition  and  custom  in  this  land  where 
ninety-five  per  cent  of  the  people  are  claimed  by  the  Roman 
Catholic  Church,  yet  in  many  large  sections  of  the  republic, 
where  no  religious  services  are  held  from  one  year  to  another, 
the  more  intelligent  classes  are  slipping  away  from  the  Church's 
hold  and  even  the  common  people  are  beginning  to  criticize 
and  ridicule  the  practises  of  the  church  and  the  lives  of  its  clergy. 
The  need  and  opportunity  for  the  Protestant  mission  are 
apparent,  to  stem  the  drift  toward  skepticism  or  indifference, 
and  to  lead  to  a  reasonable  and  living  faith  those  who  have 
broken  with  the  form  of  Christianity  in  which  they  were 
trained.  The  way  is  open  to  the  missionaries,  if  only  their 
hands  are  sustained  and  the  needs  of  the  growing  enterprise 
in  Mexico  are  wisely  met. 


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DIAGRAM    SHOWING    COMPARATIVE    INCREASE    IN   MISSIONABIES  AND   NATIVE 
WORKERS    SINCE    1825 


Chapter  XXVI 

A  NEW  ERA 

Abroad 

Although  this  closing  period  of  the  Board's  first  century 
is  eminently  the  period  of  increase,  the  growth  has  not  been 
The  conspicuous  in  all  ways.     It  has  not  been  marked 

Developed  in  the  number  of  missions;  twenty  now  as  against 
Missions  seventeen  in  1880,  far  fewer  than  midway  in  the 
century,  and  with  but  one  mission  (the  Philippine)  opened 
in  the  last  twenty  years.  Neither  has  the  large  increase  been 
in  the  number  of  missionaries,  597  now  as  against  416  then. 
Indeed,  the  roll  of  general  missionaries  has  hardly  been  main- 
tained; there  are  now  but  178  ordained  men  as  against  156 
thirty  years  ago. 

It  is  when  we  turn  to  the  native  factor  in  the  mission  enter- 
prise that  the  figures  begin  to  reveal  the  growth.  Churches 
have  more  than  doubled  in  the  period,  and  church  membership 
has  increased  more  than  fourfold.  The  native  workers  are 
now  almost  four  times  as  many  as  in  1880,  4723  against  1269. 
Ordained  pastors  have  more  than  doubled  in  number;  lay 
preachers  have  increased  fifty  per  cent;  teachers  have  mul- 
tiplied nearly  fivefold,  and  other  native  workers  over  four- 
fold, the  latter  number  indicating  the  diversified  lines  of  work 
that  have  developed  and  the  larger  part  that  the  natives  have 
in  them.  In  short,  the  era  of  native  leadership  and  self-reli- 
ance in  church  and  community  has  begun.  It  has  yet  scarcely 
more  than  begun  in  many  of  the  stations  and  some  of  the 
missions;  it  is  not  advancing  at  uniform  rate  in  all  fields.  But 
it  has  unmistakably  arrived. 

475 


476  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

This  new  era  is  impressively  reflected  in  mission  finances. 
The  principle  of  self-support  for  the  native  chm*ch  and  for 

the  individual  native  in  school  and  hospital  was 
g®  "  indeed  admitted  and  somewhat  practised  during  the 

middle  period.  But  this  generation  has  seen  the 
principle  come  to  wide  acceptance  and  adoption.  That  the 
number  of  self-supporting  churches  is  not  yet  so  large  as  was 
expected  by  this  time  is  due  to  the  many  catastrophes  which 
have  befallen  in  mission  lands.  In  South  Africa,  in  Turkey, 
in  parts  of  China,  in  India,  and  Micronesia,  immense  and 
unforeseen  obstacles  have  appeared  in  the  path  of  self-support. 
In  all  of  these  lands,  sometimes  for  long  periods,  the  peoples  for 
one  cause  or  another  have  been  able  to  do  little  more  than 
keep  body  and  soul  together.  Yet  in  spite  of  these  adver- 
sities, gains  have  been  made.  More  than  a  third  of  the 
churches  in  the  Board's  fields  are  now  entirely  self-supporting 
and  many  more  provide  for  a  large  part  of  their  expenses.  More- 
over, by  the  payment  of  tuitions  and  medical  fees,  or  by  con- 
tributions to  schools  and  hospitals  and  by  gifts  of  money  for 
evangehstic  work  in  their  own  districts  or  in  regions  beyond, 
the  native  Christians  have  shown  not  only  their  loyalty  to 
Christ,  but  their  sense  of  responsibility  for  the  establishment 
of  his  kingdom.  The  native  contributions  in  1909,  which 
include  gifts  of  the  people  for  all  these  objects,  amounted  to 
$276,715.  As  the  average  day's  wage  in  these  several  lands  is 
but  twenty  cents,  this  sum  is  equivalent  to  a  gift  of  over  two 
million  dollars  by  so  many  of  the  wage-earners  of  this  country. 
Not  only  do  these  churches  provide  the  money  for  their 
conduct,  but  they  are  more  and    more  providing  the  men. 

Though  the  principle  of  native  leadership  has  been 
Leadersh'o    ^^^^P^^^     since     Secretary    Anderson's    day,   and 

though  from  that  time  the  American  Board  has 
led  the  way  among  missionary  societies  in  this  method  of 
developing  missionary  work,  yet  it  has  been  in  the  last 
generation  that  the  great  advance  has  been  made.     It  proved 


A  NEW  ERA  477 

hard  and  in  many  cases  seemed  dangerous  to  put  responsi- 
bility and  authority  into  the  hands  of  partially  trained  men, 
unaccustomed  to  leadership  and  undisciplined  in  exercise  of 
power.  The  people  themselves  often  preferred  to  have  mis- 
sionaries as  their  pastors  rather  than  men  of  their  own  number. 
Church  quarrels,  such  as  will  occur  in  lands  where  Christianity 
has  been  longer  established,  broke  up  some  attempts  at  self- 
government.  In  spite  of  a  sincere  purpose  to  put  the  theory 
into  practise,  there  was  hesitancy  at  times  when  it  came  to 
the  concrete  case. 

Even  so  other  missionary  societies  have  argued  that  the 
American  Board  was  moving  too  fast  in  this  direction  and 
that  by  this  policy  an  unfortunate  separation  was  likely  to 
come  between  the  native  churches  and  their  pastors,  left  too 
soon  to  their  own  resources,  and  the  missionaries,  thus  shut 
away  from  the  people  in  institutional  work.  Yet  little  by 
little  in  all  the  missions  the  principle  has  won  its  way  in  prac- 
tise either  through  pressure  from  the  missionaries  or  upon 
them.  Not  only  in  the  maintenance  of  a  native  pastorate, 
but  beyond  that,  in  a  growing  oversight  of  districts,  in  care  of 
local  and  district  missionary  and  church  extension  societies, 
and  by  the  introduction  of  their  leaders  into  conferences  with 
missionaries,  the  churches  which  have  grown  from  the  American 
Board's  work  are  in  this  new  era  actually  becoming  self-govern- 
ing and  self-propagating  as  well  as  self-sustaining. 

The  advance  of  the  native  church  and  community  into 
greater  importance  has  not  left  the  missionaries  without  a 
The  t^sk.     Rather  has  it  enlarged  the  sphere  of  their 

Mission-  influence.  The  new  or  more  specialized  lines  of 
aries'  New  mission  work  which  have  appeared  in  this  period. 
Field  g^^(j^  in   particular,  the   higher  educational  institu- 

tions, which  have  been  almost  altogether  the  product  of  these 
years,  have  in  some  respects  laid  heavier  responsibilities  upon 
the  shoulders  of  the  missionaries. 

How  greatly  the  field  of  education  has  opened  as  this  depart- 


478  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

ment  has  been  reconstructed  and  systematized  from  kinder- 
garten to  professional  school  is  shown  in  part  by  a  comparison 
of  figures.  In  1880  no  particular  mention  was  made  in  the 
Board's  annual  reports  of  colleges  or  institutions  of  higher 
grade,  save  that  they  were  roughly  grouped  under  ''station 
classes."  At  the  end  of  the  period  there  are  distinctly  classi- 
fied fourteen  theological  and  training-schools,  with  210  students, 
and  fifteen  colleges,  with  nearly  1700  students.  Girls'  schools 
of  high  and  boarding  grade  were  recognized  in  1880  and 
numbered  thirty-seven;  now  there  are  132,  growing  from  1300 
to  over  12,000  pupils,  nearly  a  tenfold  increase.  The  other 
schools  of  lower  grade  have  nearly  doubled,  from  709  to  1335, 
with  more  than  twice  as  many  pupils,  56,000  instead  of  25,000. 
The  total  number  of  pupils  under  instruction  in  all  mission 
schools  of  various  grades  is  now  two  and  a  half  times  as  large 
as  in  1880,  73,868  instead  of  28,000.  The  last  third  of  the 
Board's  years  of  life  has  seen  an  increase  from  two  to  fourfold 
in  this  department  alone. 

A  larger  field  of  influence  has  opened  for  the  missionaries 
in  teaching  and  training  this  host  of  picked  students  and  in 
putting  on  them  the  impress  of  their  own  Christian  manhood 
and  womanhood.  As  truly  and  as  effectively  evangelistic  as 
the  work  of  the  touring  missionary  is  this  task  of  the  missionary 
teacher.  Here,  too,  the  new  native  leadership  is  recognized, 
as  graduates  of  these  higher  schools  return  to  serve  on  boards 
of  instruction  or  management.  Soon  the  foreign  teacher  will 
become  less  necessary  in  many  of  these  institutions;  for  some 
of  them  the  time  of  native  administration  may  not  be  remote. 

The  extent  to  which  the  native  Christian  forces  have  been 
The  Spec-  developed  during  this  period  is  most  apparent  when 
tacle  of  one  sees  the  Christian  community  as  it  exists  to- 
Christian  day  in  some  of  the  older  stations  of  the  Board. 
Centers  Aintab,  a  city  of  50,000  inhabitants  in  Central 
Turkey,  the  first  point  in  all  the  region  to  be  occupied  by  the 
Board  in  1847,  is  now  a  stronghold  of  evangehcal  Christianity. 


PLAN  OF  A  REPRESENTATIVE  MISSION  STATION 

The  shaded  ^portions  indicate  land  owned  by  the  Mission 


1  BARTON    HALL     (UNION    TRAINING 

SCHOOL   dormitory) 

2  MALIWADA   HINDU    GIRLS'    SCHOOL 

3  WILLIAMS     HOUSE      (THEOLOGICAL 

SEMINARY   dormitory) 

4  girls'  school  and  bungalow 

5  mission  bungalow,  chapin  home 

(widows'  home)  AND  ALICE 
HOUSE    (girls'    dormitory) 

8  MISSION     BUNGALOW    AND    HARRIS 

HALL  (high  SCHOOL  DORMITORY) 

9  MISSION    BUNGALOW 

10  MISSION    BUNGALOW 

1 1  MISSION  BUNGALOW,  OLD  CHURCH, 

VERNACULAR  GIRLS'  SCHOOL, 
AND  BIBLE  WOMEN's  TRAINING 
SCHOOL 


12 
13 
14 

15 
17 


18 

19 
20 
21 


MISSION    BUNGALOW 

NEW   FIRST    CHURCH 

THEOLOGICAL    SEMINARY 

JUNA  BAZAR  HINDU  GIRLS'  SCHOOL 

MISSION  HIGH  SCHOOL,  INDUSTRIAL 

SCHOOL,    AND     UNION   TRAINING 

SCHOOL 

ananda    sadan     (small    boys' 

dormitory) 
second  church 

saliwada  hindu  girls'  school 
nalegaon  hindu  boys'  school 


A  NEW  ERA  479 

It  contains  a  Protestant  community  of  5000,  has  four  self-sus- 
taining evangelical  churches,  with  native  pastors,  large  congre- 
gations, Sunday-schools,  Christian  Endeavor  societies,  and  all 
the  activities  of  the  modern  church;  is  the  home  of  a  college 
with  200  students,  with  all  but  two  of  its  seventeen  instructors 
native  to  the  country,  and  which  sends  out  trained  young  men 
as  leaders  in  the  professions  and  industries  of  the  land;  supports 
an  orphanage  in  which  are  being  trained  continuously  100 
or  more  children  gathered  from  the  region,  and  a  hospital 
serving  the  needs  of  all  comers,  not  only  from  the  city,  but 
from  nearly  a  score  of  towns  and  villages  round  about;  and 
a  girls'  boarding-school  from  which  teachers.  Christian  workers, 
and  home  makers  go  forth  to  become  lights  in  their  communi- 
ties. In  all  the  varied  and  stirring  life  of  these  establishments 
and  of  this  Christian  community  the  force  of  native  life  is 
powerfully  felt.  The  women  of  the  churches  maintain  Bible 
women  and  are  now  sending  them  even  to  Mohammedan 
homes. 

And  there  is  Ahmednagar,  on  the  Board's  oldest  mission 
field  in  India,  a  veritable  hive  of  industry,  with  a  score  of 
missionaries  in  residence,  and  a  mission  plant  comprising  twenty 
or  more  buildings  scattered  throughout  the  city  as  convenience 
and  need  have  indicated.  With  these  missionaries  are  asso- 
ciated 100  native  workers  in  a  bewildering  variety  of  enter- 
prises touching  all  sides  of  the  life  of  the  people.  Churches, 
a  theological  seminary,  high  schools,  vernacular  schools  of 
several  grades,  an  industrial  school  with  five  organized  depart- 
ments of  practical  training,  teachers'  training-schools,  girls' 
schools,  a  Bible  women's  training-school,  a  women's  hospital 
and  dispensary,  and  a  rescue  home  for  women  are  some  of 
the  items  indicating  how  the  Christian  society  at  Ahmednagar 
has  developed  in  numbers,  importance,  and  power,  and  how 
the  forces  that  are  to  make  over  and  make  Christian  that 
section  of  India  are  becoming  efficient.  For  from  the  theo- 
logical  seminary,   through   all   these   different  fields  of  work 


480  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

and  training,  the  Christian  Hindu  labors  side  by  side  with 
the  missionary  for  the  upHfting  of  his  people. 

As  one  more  illustration  of  native  Christian  leadership  may 
be  taken  Foochow,  whose  story  goes  back  to  1848,  before  the 
second  period  began.  In  this  capital  of  a  province  containing 
over  20,000,000  people,  and  itself  one  of  the  foremost  student 
centers  of  China,  the  Board  has  a  station  in  which  all  lines 
of  mission  activity  are  in  vigorous  operation,  and  in  them  all, 
leading  or  aiding,  are  to  be  found  the  Chinese  Christians. 
In  the  city  and  its  suburbs  are  eighteen  fully  organized  and 
growing  churches.  The  first  Christian  Endeavor  Society  in 
China  was  organized  here  in  1885,  and  the  spirit  and  method 
of  this  organization  have  been  of  great  aid  in  developing  Chris- 
tian life  not  only  in  the  churches,  but  in  the  schools,  particu- 
larly those  of  higher  grade.  In  the  city  a  theological  seminary 
combines  foreign  and  Chinese  teachers  in  equal  number;  the 
important  boys'  college,  with  over  250  students,  two-fifths  of 
them  either  Christian  or  of  Christian  parentage;  the  girls' 
college,  with  nearly  100  pupils  in  preparatory  or  college  grade ; 
a  score  of  day  schools,  two  evening  schools,  a  kindergarten,  and 
an  efficient  hospital,  are  not  merely  channels  of  missionary 
influence;  through  them,  also,  Chinese  Christians  are  reaching 
their  own  people.  Native  pastors  are  ordained  over  all  the 
larger  and  self-supporting  churches;  others  assist  the  mis- 
sionaries in  supervising  the  smaller  churches  and  in  working 
in  the  outer  districts.  A  strong  evangelistic  movement  has 
been  carried  on  in  the  city  and  out  into  the  country  villages 
by  the  Christians  of  these  churches,  in  union  ^vith  members 
of  churches  of  other  missions.  There  is  a  native  home  mis- 
sionary society;  Bible  women  are  supported  by  the  Christian 
women  of  the  churches;  evangehstic  campaigns  are  conducted 
by  a  union  of  the  churches  of  several  missions. 

While  thus  in  many  or  all  fields  the  missionaries  have  been 
turning  over  to  native  hands  much  that  used  to  be  their  own 
daily  care,  new  and  significant  doors  of  influence  have  been 


A  NEW  ERA  481 

opened  to  them.  From  the  early  years  it  has  been  given  to 
some  missioriaries  to  come  into  acquaintance  and  influence  with 

. men  of  high  position  in  the  lands  where  they  have 

Influence  ^^^^^^'  ^^^  within  the  last  period  there  has  been 
far  more  general  opportunity  for  the  missionary 
body  as  a  whole  to  affect  the  life  of  city,  district,  and  some- 
times of  province  and  of  nation  through  personal  approach  to 
men  of  power.  The  results  of  long  years  of  foundation  work 
have  appeared  in  this  way  also,  as  the  trusty  character  of  the 
American  Board  and  its  representatives  has  come  to  be  an 
article  of  faith  with  rulers  and  men  of  affairs  throughout  the 
mission  fields. 

By  fidelity  and  helpfulness  in  times  of  famine  or  plague, 
of  national  disaster  or  local  distress,  the  missionary  of  the 
American  Board  has  won  reputation  as  a  faithful  and  com- 
petent friend  and  helper,  until  even  those  officials  who  do 
not  accept  his  message  will  often  rely  on  his  judgment  and 
his  loyalty  and  turn  to  him  for  advice  and  support  in  the  hour 
of  need.  In  Japan,  upon  her  advent  into  world  pohtics  and 
relations;  in  reconstruction  days  in  China,  after  the  Boxer 
massacres;  in  Micronesia,  in  the  new  colonial  readjustments; 
in  India,  in  her  period  of  groping  and  unrest;  in  South  Africa, 
revising  her  pohcy  in  native  affairs;  and,  last  of  all,  in  Turkey, 
in  the  establishment  of  constitutional  government  and  in  the 
endeavor  of  local  or  provincial  officers  to  carry  out  the  provi- 
sions of  the  new  government,  again  and  again  there  has  gone 
an  appeal  to  the  missionary  for  help. 

This  is  not  to  say  that  the  missionary  is  everywhere  or  in 
all  things  gaining  a  freer  hand.  In  some  ways  his  field  has 
been  more  restricted  with  the  new  stirrings  of  racial  pride  or 
of  national  spirit;  and  through  all  the  East  the  missionary  has 
had  to  bear  some  of  the  odium  that  has  been  put  upon  the 
foreigner  in  the  land.  It  has  not  always  been  so  easy  as  of 
old  to  control  students  in  the  higher  schools  and  colleges,  or 
to  guide  the  native  brethren  in  the  management  of  their  Chris- 


482  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

tian  institutions.  Yet,  on  the  whole,  the  gains  far  outweigh 
the  losses,  and  the  missionary  during  this  last  period  of  the 
Board's  history  has  come  to  occupy  a  stronger  and  more  influ- 
ential position,  albeit,  like  the  Board  he  serves,  a  less  dom- 
inant and  ruling  position  than  of  old.  He  recognizes  that  he 
must  accept  with  new  respect,  not  only  the  potential  strength 
of  the  natives  for  whom  he  is  working,  but  their  actual  readi- 
ness to  share  in  responsibility.  If  he  is  to  take  his  part  hence- 
forth as  one  among  equals,  it  is  none  the  less  possible  for  him 
to  rank  first  among  equals  by  reason  of  his  longer  experience, 
his  broader  knowledge,  and  his  deeper  and  more  ingrained 
love.  And  as  he  is  willing  to  lose  his  life  in  giving  room  and 
leadership  to  the  natives  whom  he  trains,  he  is  really  finding 
a  larger  life. 

A  further  line  of  progress  on  the  mission  fields  is  in  union 
effort.  In  this  period  very  notably  the  different  missionary 
The  societies  have  been  getting  together,   not  only  in 

Union  of  sympathy  and  good-will,  but  in  cooperation.  So 
Missions  rapid  and  strong  has  been  this  movement  that 
there  is  now  hardly  a  field  of  the  Board's  work  adjoining  that 
of  other  societies  where  some  experiment  in  union  is  not  being 
tried,  and  scarcely  a  year  passes  without  a  new  project  of  this 
sort  being  reported.  The  great  missionary  assemblies,  like 
the  so-called  Ecumenical  Conference  in  New  York,  in  1909; 
the  Madras  Conference  in  India,  in  1902;  the  Shanghai  Con- 
ference in  China,  in  1907;  the  Edinburgh  Conference  held  this 
very  year,  1910,  as  they  have  reflected  the  temper  of  the  mis- 
sion fields,  have  immensely  stimulated  the  disposition  to 
devise  plans  by  which  with  greater  economy  and  concentration 
of  power  the  needs  of  the  whole  field  may  be  better  served.  So 
in  one  form  or  another,  and  in  some  missions  in  various  forms, 
as  already  described,  the  work  of  the  different  societies  is 
becoming  more  nearly  one,  and  denominational  and  racial 
barriers  are  being  broken  down.  In  India  they  have  even 
formed   a   National   Home   Missionary   Society,   wherein   the 


A  NEW  ERA  483 

Christians  of  different  communions  and  races  are  united  for 
an  evangelistic  enterprise  in  their  land  that  shall  disregard 
the  boundaries  of  mission  or  sect  or  district.  In  many  ways 
it  is  apparent  that  so  far  as  formal  organization  is  concerned, 
missions  and  the  mission  Boards  behind  them  are  bound  to 
decrease  in  conspicuousness  and  authority  that  in  all  lands 
the  native  Christian  Church  may  increase. 

At  Home 

The  years  following  the  disposal  of  the  Otis  and  Swett 
legacies  were  heavy  for  all  concerned  in  the  Board's  manage- 
ment. While  the  annual  outlay  had  been  increased, 
Waters^  the  annual  income  was  not  growing  proportionately. 
The  expectation  that  by  the  time  the  bequests  were 
exhausted  and  the  new  missions  established  the  receipts  of 
the  Board  would  be  enlarged  through  the  growth  of  the  churches 
at  home  and  their  advancing  missionary  interest  had  proved  ill- 
founded.  It  became  necessary  to  stop  at  once  all  further  ex- 
pansion of  fields  and  to  limit  with  increasing  stringency  the 
expenditures  of  the  several  missions.  The  burden  of  debt  was 
either  pressing  or  threatening  through  all  this  decade. 

A  Committee  on  Extra  Gifts  devised  a  plan  in  1891  for 
raising  an  additional  $100,000  during  the  year,  themselves 
pledging  one-fourth  of  it.  And  the  receipts  for  1892  did 
reach  $840,000,  as  against  $824,000  in  1891  and  $762,000  in 
1890.  But  the  following  year  they  dropped  to  $679,000, 
never  reached  $750,000  again  for  a  decade,  and  showed  violent 
fluctuations  from  year  to  year.  By  special  efforts  of  the  Com- 
mittee of  Nine  and  a  generous  promise  from  Mr.  D.  Willis 
James  of  a  conditional  $25,000,  a  debt  of  $166,000  in  1894 
was  cleared  away  before  March,  1896.  The  campaign  for 
raising  this  debt  proved  once  more  the  love  and  loyalty  of 
the  Board's  constituency.  The  rush  of  gifts  in  the  last  three 
days,  when  it  looked  as  though  the  effort  might  fail,  carried 
the  amount  quite  above  the  sum  needed. 


484  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

In  the  strenuous  efforts  of  these  years  to  make  the  receipts 
match  expenditures  and  to  awaken  the  churches  to  the  require- 
jjg^  ments  of  the  growing  enterprise,  several  new  plans 

Methods  were  devised.  In  1894  Cooperating  Committees  were 
and  appointed  to  aid  the  district  secretaries  in  the  cul- 

Machinery  tivation  of  their  fields.  Composed  of  representative 
men  of  the  denomination,  clergymen  and  laymen,  these  com- 
mittees have  ever  since  been  of  great  service  in  devising  and 
pressing  new  methods  of  approach  to  the  churches.  In  1898 
the  Forward  Movement  was  inaugurated  under  the  conduct 
of  an  Advisory  Committee,  appointed  by  the  chairmen  of 
the  several  Cooperating  Committees.  The  Forward  Move- 
ment was  designed  to  supplement  the  ordinary  lines  of  cul- 
tivation; its  particular  plan  was  to  interest  individuals,  single 
churches,  and  groups  of  churches,  in  the  support  of  assigned 
missionaries.  This  endeavor,  pursued  for  three  years  with 
vigor  and  success  by  Mr.  Luther  D.  Wishard,  was  at 
length,  in  1905,  merged  into  the  general  work  of  the  Home 
Department  and  linked  with  other  new  plans  for  bringing  the 
churches  into  more  direct  touch  with  the  mission  fields  and 
to  a  keener  sense  of  responsibility  for  their  maintenance.  So 
successful  has  this  plan  proved  that  now  almost  every  mission- 
ary of  the  American  Board  and  many  of  those  sustained  by 
the  Woman's  Boards  are  being  supported  by  some  church, 
individual,  auxiliary,  or  group  of  auxiliaries. 

The  Board  had  by  this  time  gotten  far  away  from  its  early 
system  of  numerous  districts  and  agencies  through  the  country. 
Instead  of  the  eight  district  offices  of  1835  and  the  six  at  the 
time  of  the  semi-centennial,  on  the  seventy-fifth  anniversary 
there  was  one  in  New  York  and  another  in  Chicago;  an  agency 
on  the  Pacific  coast  was  organized  as  the  third  district  ofl&ce 
in  1903.  Woman's  Boards  were  now  conducting  a  systematic 
solicitation  of  gifts  far  beyond  anything  attempted  by  the 
auxiliaries  and  agencies  of  early  days. 

Increasing  attention  was  being  paid  to  publications  as  a 


A  NEW  ERA  485 

means  of  reaching  contributors.  In  1897  a  low-priced  mis- 
sionary paper,  Congregational  Work,  was  started  by  a  union 
of  the  denominational  missionary  societies,  with  a  paid  sub- 
scription list  of  over  104,000  names.  As  the  first  enthusiasm 
for  the  paper  wore  away  and  the  churches  ceased  to  subscribe 
for  their  members  en  hloc,  this  number  was  more  than  cut  in 
two.  Yet  through  all  its  history  Congregational  Work  appealed 
to  a  distinct  and  large  constituency  and  carried  to  them  a 
monthly  report  of  the  home  and  foreign  missionary  work  of 
the  denomination.  In  1909,  when  the  several  home  mis- 
sionary magazines  were  merged  into  one,  the  promoters  of 
the  new  magazine  felt  that  in  the  interests  of  that  publication 
they  must  withdraw  from  the  support  of  Congregational  Work, 
and  it  was  thereupon  discontinued. 

The  Missionary  Herald  has  been  maintained  and  recast 
during  the  period  to  conform  to  the  advancing  standards  of 
magazine  work,  and,  though  its  circulation  is  less  than  in  the 
days  when  there  were  fewer  lines  of  missionary  information, 
it  still  has  a  large  and  important  circle  of  readers  and  is  the 
Board's  most  constant  and  reliable  agency  of  promotion.  A 
variety  of  smaller  publications,  occasional  or  periodical,  was 
put  forth;  sketches  of  different  missions;  annual  summaries; 
the  Envelope  Series;  and  in  the  last  part  of  the  period  the 
Pastors'  Series,  Quarterly  Bulletins,  and  other  special  leaflets 
and  pamphlets  were  devised  for  different  classes.  The  Ameri- 
can Board  Almanac,  begun  in  1886,  was  an  original  contribu- 
tion to  missionary  periodical  literature.  With  its  summaries 
of  the  year's  statistics  for  all  foreign  mission  Boards,  and  its 
wealth  of  classified  information  as  to  American  Board  affairs, 
it  has  proved  a  welcome  handbook  both  within  and  without 
the  circle  of  the  Board's  supporters.  Life  and  Light,  the 
monthly  organ  of  the  three  Woman's  Boards,  has  won  a  large 
and  influential  place  among  the  women  of  the  churches,  while 
Mission  Studies  of  the  Woman's  Board  of  the  Interior 
has  covered  in  the  same  way  its  more  limited  district.     The 


486  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

Mission  Day  spring,  jointly  conducted  by  the  American  Board 
and  the  Woman's  Boards  as  a  children's  paper,  has  served 
well  its  special  field.  Various  books,  like  the  well-known  Ely 
Volume,  Dr.  Laurie's  labor  of  love  through  which  he  exploited 
the  large  service  of  the  Board's  missions  to  the  general  cause 
of  human  welfare,  with  various  lives  of  distinguished  mis- 
sionaries of  the  Board,  and,  more  lately,  authoritative  works 
by  several  missionaries  on  the  lands  where  their  fields  lie,  have 
helped  to  spread  information  and  to  awaken  and  sustain  a 
growing  interest  in  the  work  of  the  Board. 

The  days  in  which  a  few  men  could  transact  the  business 
of  the  American  Board,  write  the  letters,  and  keep  the  records 
A  Solidi-  in  autograph,  and  make  their  slow  journeys  by 
fying  Busi-  stage  or  boat  to  visit  different  parts  of  the  country, 
ness  -^ere  now  far  past.     The  Board's  multiplied  affairs 

and  the  increased  demands  upon  its  officers  required  the  intro- 
duction of  new  and  approved  business  methods  and  apparatus. 
By  the  removal  of  "the  Rooms"  from  the  corner  of  Somerset 
and  Beacon  Streets  to  the  new  Congregational  House  at  14 
Beacon  Street,  Boston,  in  1898,  the  Board  secured  more  com- 
modious quarters  and  accelerated  the  work  of  the  several 
departments,  which  were  then  reorganized.  Simply  as  a  busi- 
ness house  it  was  now  conducting  a  large  enterprise.  In  1895 
sixty-nine  shipments  were  sent  from  the  Rooms  to  eighteen 
different  ports,  aggregating  nearly  2000  packages,  and  valued 
at  over  $50,000.  Through  all  changes  the  prestige  of  the 
Board,  its  financial  standing,  the  trustworthiness  of  its  mis- 
sionaries, and  the  stability  of  its  plans  and  undertakings,  were 
unshaken,  and  each  year  brought  to  it  added  confidence  both 
on  the  fields  of  its  work  and  in  the  homeland.  The  bills  of 
exchange  sent  out  by  the  Board  were  in  all  its  missions  re- 
garded as  financial  paper  of  highest  grade;  not  only  the  formal 
contract,  but  the  word  of  a  representative  of  the  Board  was 
counted  as  good  as  gold. 

The  great  and  increasing  burden  in  the  home  administration 


A  NEW  ERA  487 

of  the  Board  at  the  middle  of  this  period  was  the  securing  of 
the  necessary  funds.  During  the  financial  depression  of  1897 
and  for  the  remaining  years  of  the  century  the 
StraS  ^  supplying  of  the  needs  of  the  treasury  became  des- 
perately hard.  Receipts  fluctuated  so  widely  as 
to  make  the  heart  swing  from  hope  almost  to  despair. 

Meanwhile  there  was  dire  exigency  on  many  of  the  fields, 
and  these  years  of  financial  shrinkage  at  home  were  years  of 
cruel  strain  abroad.  Massacre  and  depression  in  the  Turkish 
missions,  famine  and  pestilence  in  India,  war  between  China 
and  Japan,  a  religious  reaction  in  the  latter  country,  which 
threatened  the  defection  of  the  Kumi-ai  churches  and  the 
temporary  loss  of  the  Doshisha;  war  again  (the  Spanish- 
American),  affecting  work  not  only  in  that  empire,  but  in 
Micronesia;  the  overwhelming  Boxer  uprising  in  Northern 
China  and  Shansi,  the  rebelhon  in  Zululand,  and  the  tem- 
porary alienation  of  the  Christian  community  there,  —  all 
combined  to  lay  upon  the  supporters  and  administrators  of 
the  Board's  work  a  fairly  crushing  burden  of  care  and  anxiety. 

That  the  Board  was  able  to  weather  this  storm,  which 
seemed  to  break  from  every  quarter  at  once,  and  to  come 
through  it  all  without  losing  a  mission  or  hardly  a  station, 
and  with  no  impairment  of  its  financial  credit  or  of  the  large 
confidence  of  its  supporters  at  home  and  the  peoples  for  whom 
it  was  laboring  abroad,  is  a  tribute  to  the  wisdom  of  those 
who  guided  its  affairs,  but  even  more  a  witness  to  the  sustain- 
ing and  dehvering  grace  of  God,  who  in  every  crucial  hour  has 
wrought  wondrously  for  the  Board's  relief. 

In  1903  the  Twentieth  Century  Fund  was  started,  its  pur- 
pose being  to  equalize  receipts  from  legacies  year  by  year, 
the  sums  accruing  in  the  years  of  larger  bequests  being  so 
treated  that  part  of  the  gain  is  held  to  relieve  the  years  when 
the  receipts  fall  below  the  average.  In  the  same  year,  1903, 
a  Department  for  Young  People  and  Education  was  organized 
under  Mr.  Harry  Wade  Hicks,  called  for  this  purpose  from 


488  STORY  OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

the  service  of  the  Young  Men's  Christian  Association  to  an 
assistant  secretaryship,  and  by  whom  were  devised  courses 
of  mission  study  and  other  measures  for  strengthening  the 
tie  between  the  youth  of  the  churches  and  their  foreign  mis- 
sionary board. 

In  the  midst  of  these  struggles  to  hft  the  receipts  of  the 
Board  so  as  to  prevent  either  further  retrenchment  or  renewed 
Mr.Rocke-  debt,  a  controversy  was  precipitated  that  for  a 
feller's  time  added  to  the  burden.  Upon  intimation  from 
^^*  sources  near  to  Mr.  John  D.   Rockefeller  that  he 

might  be  interested  in  the  work  of  the  Board,  since  some  of 
his  widespread  charities  had  been  given  in  similar  lines,  a 
presentation  of  its  higher  educational  work  had  some  time 
before  been  made  to  him.  After  interviews  and  correspondence 
with  the  appointed  almoners  of  Mr.  Rockefeller's  philanthropies, 
in  February,  1905,  came  the  promise  that  he  would  give  to 
the  American  Board  $100,000  for  definite  objects,  mainly 
educational.  Upon  the  acceptance  of  the  gift  and  its  appro- 
priation the  money  was  paid  over  as  it  was  needed. 

When  the  receipt  of  this  sum,  the  largest  so  far  coming  to 
the  Board  from  a  living  donor,  became  known  through  acknowl- 
edgment in  the  Missionary  Herald,  protests  were  made  to 
the  Prudential  Committee  from  ministers  and  laymen,  asking 
that  the  money  be  declined  or  returned,  on  the  ground  that 
the  business  methods  of  the  Standard  Oil  Company,  of  which 
Mr.  Rockefeller  was  president,  were  commonly  believed  to 
be  immoral  and  injurious.  These  protests  were  at  once  carried 
into  the  field  of  open  and  popular  debate,  with  sharp  conflicts 
of  opinion. 

The  real  questions  at  issue  were:  Did  the  acceptance  or 
solicitation  of  this  gift  imply  an  endorsement  of  the  Standard 
Oil  Company's  business  methods  or  any  judgment  as  to  Mr. 
Rockefeller's  personal  character?  Did  it  compromise  the 
ethical  standards  which  a  Christian  missionary  society  should 
maintain?     Did  the  reception  of  a  gift  bestowed  in  this  way 


A  NEW  ERA  489 

bring  the  receiver  into  any  silencing  partnership  with  the 
giver?  On  these  questions,  concerning  which  high-minded 
and  clear-sighted  men  in  the  Board's  constituency  took  oppo- 
site views,  no  formal  answer  was  ever  rendered  by  the  Board. 
Public  discussion  soon  drifted  to  a  host  of  matters  more  or 
less  allied.  In  the  minds  of  many  of  the  disputants  the  issue 
reached  far  beyond  the  case  in  hand,  so  that  they  seemed 
little  concerned  with  its  facts.  Many  misleading  impressions 
prevailed,  such  as  that  the  Board  had  observed  an  unusual 
secrecy  in  the  case  of  this  benefaction  until  the  donor  had 
demanded  that  he  should  have  due  credit  for  it,  whereas  the 
proceedings  in  the  solicitation,  acceptance,  and  acknowledg- 
ment of  this  gift  were  such  as  had  been  followed  before  and 
have  been  pursued  since  in  the  securing  of  large  gifts  from 
individuals. 

When  the  case  was  presented  at  the  annual  meeting  in 
Seattle,  in  1905,  in  the  question  whether  the  procedure  of  the 
Board's  representatives  should  be  disapproved  or  allowed,  a 
preliminary  canvass  had  showed  that  the  great  majority  of 
the  corporate  body  justified  the  Committee's  position.  The 
majority  of  a  committee  appointed  at  that  meeting  to  con- 
sider the  matter  took  the  same  ground;  but  after  free  discus- 
sion it  was  voted  to  lay  on  the  table  both  their  report  and  the 
modified  adverse  report  of  the  minority,  the  determining 
of  the  issue  thus  being  left  with  the  Prudential  Committee. 

Since  then  no  further  action  or  public  discussion  upon  the 
question  has  been  undertaken  by  the  Board.  But  upon  fur- 
ther conference  between  some  individuals,  members  of  the 
Prudential  Committee,  and  certain  of  the  protestants,  it  was 
tacitly  understood  among  them  that  the  Board  in  soliciting 
gifts  would  seek  to  show  consideration  for  the  convictions  of 
those  who  had  been  grieved  over  the  course  taken. 

This  third  period  of  the  Board's  hundred  years  is  notable 
for  the  changes  which  have  come  in  the  list  of  those  to  whom 
its  administration  has  been  committed.     Almost  every  office 


490  STORY   OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

has  had  as  many  occupants  in  the  last  thirty  years  as  in  the 

seventy  years  preceding.     It  is  impossible  even  to  mention  with 

briefest    characterization   the   several   officials   and 

ange  o  committeemen  who  have  directed  or  executed  its 
policies  during  the  time.  In  an  Appendix  to  this 
volume  will  be  found  their  names,  which,  quickened  by  the 
fortunate  memory  of  some  readers,  or  touched  by  the  historic 
imagination  of  others,  will  become  eloquent  with  the  record 
of  loving  and  loyal  service  such  as  money  cannot  purchase 
or  business  interest  command. 

Dr.  Mark  Hopkins  was  still  in  the  president's  chair  in 
1880  and  until  his  death  in  1887.  Then  came  a  decade  of 
Dr.  Richard  S.  Storr's  diplomatic  and  brilliant  leadership, 
followed  by  Dr.  Charles  M.  Lamson's  brief  term  of  two  years, 
closed  with  his  lamented  death  in  1899.  During  the  years 
since,  the  president  has  been  Samuel  B.  Capen,  LL.D.,  the  cen- 
tury closing  as  it  began  with  a  layman  in  the  president's  chair. 
Six  vice-presidents  have  served  during  this  period,  though  the 
term  of  E.  W.  Blatchford,  Esq.,  covered  nearly  half  the  years. 

Of  the  eighty-one  men  who  have  served  on  the  Prudential 
Committee  since  the  foundation  of  the  Board,  forty-four  have 
been  in  its  counsels  during  this  last  period.  A  new  rule,  adopted 
in  1893,  limiting  the  possible  term  of  consecutive  service  on 
the  Committee  to  nine  years,  is  in  part  accountable  for  this 
more  rapid  change.  Yet  the  quickened  step  and  shorter 
service  is  to  be  recognized  in  every  department.  Of  the  twenty- 
two  who  have  served  in  one  or  another  secretarial  position 
during  the  hundred  years,  ten  have  come  to  their  task  during 
the  last  thirty  years  and  six  have  in  that  time  left  the  service. 

While  the  effect  of  new  rules  has  been  to  enlarge  and  broaden 
the  corporate  membership,  the  tendency  does  not  seem  to 
be  to  increase  the  proportionate  number  of  members  at  the 
annual  meetings,  nor  has  it  yet  quickened  markedly  the  interest 
and  loyalty  of  the  members  or  of  the  churches  which  have  the 
right  to  nominate  them.     Nevertheless,  it  is  believed  that  a 


A  NEW  ERA  491 

new  and  important  tie  has  been  secured  between  the  constitu- 
ency of  the  Board  and  the  administration  of  its  work. 

Despite  such  disturbances  in  its  affairs  at  home  and  abroad 
as  have  been  recounted,  the  American  Board  is  soUdly  based 
The  today.     It   is    far   better  known  and  more  highly 

Missionary  regarded  at  the  close  of  this  period  than  it  was  at 
Awakening  ^]^g  beginning.  Interest  in  its  work  was  never  so 
general  or  so  keen  as  now.  Many  influences  have  contributed 
to  this  end.  The  hosts  of  immigrants  coming  to  these  shores 
from  all  lands,  together  with  the  enlarging  of  our  borders  and 
increase  of  our  relationship  as  a  nation,  have  compelled  the 
American  people  to  think  about  the  rest  of  mankind.  It  is 
known  to  everybody  now  that  "there  are  men  beyond  the 
mountains."  It  is  beginning  to  be  recognized  that  after  all 
the  world  is  one  body,  with  many  members;  when  one  suffers, 
all  suffer;  when  one  advances,  all  must  advance.  Moreover, 
the  Board's  missions  have  been  more  generally  studied  and 
more  closely  observed  than  in  the  earlier  periods.  Not  only 
have  deputations  from  the  Board  visited,  in  some  cases  more 
than  once,  most  of  its  mission  fields,  but  numerous  ministers 
and  laymen  have  come  back  from  travels  with  a  new  vision, 
to  report  to  their  churches  and  friends  what  they  themselves 
have  seen  of  mission  work.  If  this  closer  contact  has  robbed 
the  mission  lands  of  some  of  the  romance  that  pertains  to  the 
unknown  and  the  far  away,  it  has  made  the  work  being  done 
for  them  better  appreciated  and  more  commanding. 

The  annual  meetings  have  shown  this  increasing  regard  for 
the  Board.  While  they  were  largely  attended  and  earnest 
in  the  early  part  of  the  period,  as  at  the  Diamond  Jubilee 
in  1885,  in  Boston,  or  just  afterward  in  the  years  of  theological 
controversy,  when  the  platform  of  the  Board  became  the  field 
of  an  exciting  debate,  a  steady  growth  in  enthusiasm  has  been 
manifest  in  the  gatherings  of  these  later  years;  notably  in 
the  Haystack  Centennial  meeting  at  North  Adams  and  Will- 
iamstown,  with  its  unfading   impression  upon  all    who  were 


492  STORY  OF  THE   AMERICAN  BOARD 

present  and  the  wider  public  who  read  the  story  of  that  great 
occasion,  but  also  in  such  memorable  assemblies  as  that  in 
Hartford,  in  1901,  when  a  debt  of  $102,000  was  lifted  amid 
great  rejoicing;  at  Oberhn,the  following  year,  when  the  Chinese 
martyrs'  monument  was  dedicated;  at  Seattle,  in  1905,  when 
the  Pacific  coast  received  a  fresh  baptism  of  missionary  interest; 
at  Cleveland,  in  1907,  in  union  with  the  home  missionary 
societies  and  the  National  Council  in  a  notable  series  of  ses- 
sions; at  Brooklyn,  in  1908,  and  Minneapolis,  in  1909,  regis- 
tering the  rising  tide  of  missionary  faith  and  purpose. 

Moreover,  great  contributory  forces  for  foreign  missions 
have  been  at  work  in  America  during  the  latter  half  of  this 
period  of  th«  Board's  history.  In  quick  succession 
p®^  .  have  come  the  organization  of  the  Young  People's 
Society  of  Christian  Endeavor  (1881),  the  Student 
Volunteer  Movement  (1888),  the  Young  People's  Missionary 
Movement  (1902),  the  Laymen's  Missionary  Movement  (1906). 
All  these  agencies  have  stimulated  mightily  the  foreign  mis- 
sionary spirit  in  the  land:  the  Young  People's  Society  of  Chris- 
tian Endeavor,  though  not  primarily  a  missionary  society, 
having  loyally  turned  the  vast  energies  it  has  awakened  toward 
missions  as  a  commanding  business  of  the  Christian  Church; 
the  Student  Volunteer  Movement  sounding  through  the  col- 
leges and  universities  the  challenge  to  the  world's  last  and 
greatest  crusade,  and  bringing  thousands  of  young  people  to 
devote  their  lives  to  missionary  service;  the  Young  People's 
Missionary  Movement,  educating  the  youth  in  the  churches 
by  such  mission  study  and  missionary  giving  as  will  produce  a 
loyal  and  trained  supporting  body  for  the  missionary  forces 
at  the  front;  finally,  the  Laymen's  Movement,  springing  from 
the  enthusiasm  of  the  Haystack  Centennial,  born  in  prayer 
and  personal  devotion  of  a  little  group  of  earnest  Christian 
men,  and  effecting  in  a  few  years  a  superb  league  of  the  Chris- 
tian manhood  of  America  bent  upon  energizing  the  Christian 
Church  for  the  systematic  evangelizing  of  the  world. 


A  NEW   ERA  493 

In  close  alliance  with  all  these  organizations,  and  seeking 
to  serve  them  as  well  as  to  be  benefited  by  them,  the  American 
Board  has  felt  their  stimulus  to  its  work  both  in  the  securing 
of  missionaries  and  of  their  support.  Within  the  bounds  of  its 
particular  denomination  also,  as  the  period  closes,  is  recognized 
a  stronger  and  more  general  missionary  devotion.  The  Joint 
Missionary  Campaign  of  1909  in  the  interests  of  all  the  national 
Congregational  missionary  and  benevolent  societies  not  only 
relieved  the  debts  of  three  of  them,  including  the  American 
Board,  but  effectively  pressed  the  National  Council's  Appor- 
tionment Plan  of  benevolence  upon  the  minds  of  the  constitu- 
ency. As  a  result  in  this  closing  year,  1910,  by  a  spontaneous 
uprising  of  the  laymen  and  the  prompt  cooperation  of  the  new 
Congregational  Brotherhood,  a  most  significant  effort  is  being 
made  to  unite  as  never  before  the  churches  of  this  order  in  a 
loyal,  systematic,  and  comprehensive  endeavor  to  meet  their 
nation-wide  and  world-wide  responsibilities.  In  the  further- 
ance of  these  plans,  as  in  the  gains  from  them,  the  American 
Board  has  had  an  honorable  share.  With  it  originated  the 
suggestion  of  the  joint  campaign  of  1909,  and  its  officers 
and  constituency  generally  have  been  heartily  committed  to 
the  new  policies  and  plans,  thus  seeking  to  exalt  missions  to 
their  rightful  place  of  importance  in  the  life  of  the  Church. 

If  Carey  in  the  day  of  beginnings  could  say,  when  asked  as 
to  the  prospects,  '' Bright  as  the  promises  of  God,"  the  American 
Board  at  the  end  of  its  first  century  can  make  its 
O  tl  k  forecast,  not  merely  by  the  word  of  the  Book,  but 
as  well  by  the  signs  that  God  has  written  in  his 
sky.  With  a  larger,  more  intelligent  and  aroused  constituency 
at  home  than  ever  before  in  the  hundred  years,  with  foreign 
missions  recognized  and  approved  by  men  in  every  station 
and  walk  of  life,  with  pulpit  and  press  ready  to  champion 
the  cause  of  the  once  despised  or  forgotten  missionary,  with 
a  world  open  everywhere  save  in  a  few  remote  corners,  with 
the  tools  for  missionary  enterprise  in  hand,  an  art  of  missions 


494  STORY   OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 

as  well  as  a  science  soundly  established,  and  with  such  break-up 
of  thought  and  habit  among  the  ancient  peoples  as  opens  the 
way  to  all  teaching  of  better  things,  foreign  missions  have  not 
only  a  chance  but  an  opportunity  and  prospect  such  as  was 
not  dreamed  of  a  generation,  not  to  say  a  century,  ago. 

With  old  faiths  djang  slowly  or  more  swiftly,  with  idols 
thrown  into  the  streets  and  temples  turned  into  schools,  with 
a  longing  for  education  filling  the  far  East  and  the  desire  for 
national  and  individual  liberties  leading  to  new  ambitions  and 
new  relationships,  every  stir  in  the  heavy  mass,  though  it  pre- 
sents new  problems  and  difficulties,  challenges  the  ability  and 
evokes  the  enthusiasm  of  all  who  are  face  to  face  with  the 
situation.  The  signs  of  the  times  to  those  who  look  with  the 
eyes  of  Christ  upon  this  world  for  which  He  gave  himself 
are  inspiring  beyond  words  or  measures.  The  absorbing  task 
of  the  Christian  Church  for  this  new  century  is  to  be  the 
welding  of  the  world  in  the  Kingdom  of  God,  wherein  it  shall 
appear  that  all  nations  are  of  one  blood,  of  one  capacity,  and 
of  one  destiny  in  Jesus  Christ.  To  this  task  of  its  second 
century  the  American  Board  turns  Tvith  gratitude  and  praise 
for  the  past  and  with  prayer  and  great  hope  for  the  future. 


APPENDIXES 


496  APPENDIXES 

Appendix 
STATISTICAL  VIEW  OF  THE  MISSIONS  OF  THE 


1 

§ 

Missionaries 

Church  Statistics 

Missions 

!i 

a 

03 

!3 

1 

3 

-2 

.2 

"2  a 

■i 
1 

1 

o 
■+3 

'O 

i 

.9 

0.9 

"3 

3 

o 

O 

a 

If 

6 

5 

3 

^ 

c 

> 

3 

Cl 

a 
a 

o 

-38 

c3  g 

'^ 

'A 

o 

o 

fi^ 

CQ 

H 

PL, 

O 

O 

<: 

< 

CQ 

W.  Central 

Africa    .  .  . 

1880 

5 

22 

7 

2 

10 

8 

27 

46 

4 

625 

101 

7.000 

2,075 

South  Africa 

Zulu  Branch 

1835 

8 

23 

8 

1 

7 

8 

24 

166 

26 

5,837 

480 

16,620 

2,305 

Rhodesian 

Branch  . . . 

1893 

3 

4 

3 

4 

2 

.5 

14 

18 

2 

223 

14 

500 

222 

European 

Turkey    .  . 

1859 

5 

51 

13 

— 

6 

11 

30 

57 

19 

1,454 

90 

4,047 

2,512 

Western 

Turkey    .  . 

1819 

8 

98 

20 

6 

29 

25 

80 

126 

44 

4,704 

143 

16,771 

10,981 

Central 

Turkey    .  . 

1847 

4 

56 

8 

2 

19 

9 

38 

46 

33 

5,561 

87 

15,228 

24,479 

Eastern 

Turkey    .  . 

1836 

5 

109 

12 

3 

16 

15 

46 

84 

45 

3,050 

140 

14,132 

7,134 

Marathi 

1813 

8 

135 

14 

4 

16 

18 

52 

172 

57 

7,016 

270 

1,452 

8,030 

Madura 

1834 

10 

353 

17 

— 

7 

14 

38 

350 

36 

6,932 

478 

21,276 

8,296 

Ceylon 

1816 

6 

23 

3 

4 

4 

4 

15 

48 

20 

2,028 

93 

1,231 

4,335 

Foochow  .  .  . 

1847 

5 

104 

10 

4 

16 

10 

40 

111 

80 

2,395 

105 

5,657 

1,990 

South  China 

1883 

2 

41 

3 

— 

3 

2 

8 

48 

3 

4,802    422 

4,802 

300 

North  China 

1854 

7 

82 

18 

4 

20 

19 

61 

96 

9 

3,963 

242 

6.200 

1,067 

Shansi 

1882 

2 

10 

5 

2 

4 

6 

17 

14 

2 

203 

54 

1,305 

150 

Japan  ^    .... 

1869 

12 

55 

23 

1 

25 

22 

71 

29 

92 

15,384 

1485 

25,000 

9,000 

Philippines .  . 

1903 

1 



1 

1 



2 

4 

1 

1 

17 

3 

150 

74 

Micronesia  ^ . 

1852 

4 

38 

4 

— 

6 

4 

14 

150 

36 

5,126 

554 

6,919 

1.840 

Mexico    .... 

1872 

4 

52 

4 



4 

4 

12 

53 

22 

1,502 

122 

3,363 

1,350 

Spain 

1872 

1 

16 

i     1 

— 

4 

— 

5 

16 

8 

301 

36 

1,510 

1,014 

Austria    .... 

1872 

1 
102 

57 
1329 

2 
|176i 

38 

198  2 

2 

188  3 

4 
600 

91 
1722 

29 

1,961 

177 

7,180 

722 

Totals    . 

568 

73,084 

5096 

160,343 

87.876 

•  Of  whom  nine  are  physicians. 

2  Of  whom  eight  are  physicians. 

3  Of  whom  six  are  physicians. 


APPENDIXES 


497 


AMERICAN  BOARD  FOR  THE  YEAR  1909-191C 

Native 
Laborers 

Educational  Statistics 

Medical 
Work 

1 

§ 
1 

2 

"2 

a 
'3 

o 

1 

J 

1 
§ 

O 

1 

(0 

> 

03 

H 

6 

1 

bt  '" 

g'o 

1 

1 

1 
O 

1 

ll 

1 

K 

B 

3 

2 

1 

Q 
1 

5 
§ 

1 

i 

$1,340 

23 

152 

175 

— 

— 

— 

— 

— 

— 

32 

4,091 

4,176 

5 

28,928 

10,640 

8 

25 

589 

622 

— 

— 

— 

— 

3 

442 

73 

3,570 

4,012 

1 

1 

2,200 

711 

— 

10 

12 

22 

— 

— 

— 

— 

3 

201 

3 

314 

515 

1 

2 

1,755 

7,692 

17 

18 

74 

109 

3 

1 

85 

4 

270 

22 

512 

870 

- 

— 

— 

72,238 

38 

38 

332 

408 

2 

2 

580 

13 

1,313 

148 

6,634 

8,529 

3 

3 

43,133 

30,227 

13 

18 

289 

320 

6 

3 

431 

16 

1,236 

96 

5,372 

7,045 

2 

2 

70,475 

17,522 

20 

41 

243 

304 

13 

1 

202 

10 

463 

151 

7,400 

8,272 

5 

5 

17,416 

5,138 

43 

41 

416 

500 

28 

— 

— 

27 

2,365 

149 

4,467 

6,860 

2 

8 

49,748 

14,52a 

24 

143 

574 

741 

53 

1 

32 

11 

2,329 

226 

9,316 

11,730 

2 

1 

38,905 

12,378 

13 

13 

405 

431 

3 

1 

161 

3 

332 

120 

10,497 

10,993 

3 

3 

13,092 

15,364 

7 

69 

228 

304 

2 

2 

53 

8 

894 

105 

1,945 

2,894 

4 

4 

47,016 

2,780 

2 

43 

64 

109 

— 

3 

— 

— 

2 

78 

22 

581 

662 

— 

1 

2,000 

2,56^ 

7 

65 

133 

205 

19 

2 

73 

17 

519 

40 

576 

1,187 

3 

11 

31,207 

715 

— 

11 

37 

48 

— 

— 

— 

6 

4 

138 

4 

104 

248 

2 

3 

1,859 

48,850 

68 

33 

110 

211 

52 

2 

72 

5 

1,156 

12 

689 

1,969 

- 

~ 

— 

— 

— 

1 

3 

4 



— 









3 



— 

1 

1 

600 

6,435 

19 

41 

36 

96 

14 

— 

— 

— 

— 

86 

— 

2,569 

— 

1 

2,000 

12,477 

6 

5 

23 

34 

6 





3 

349 

6 

399 

754 

— 





7,264 

4 

3 

25 

32 

—  • 

— 

— 

— 

1 

— 

74 

— 

717 

— 

— 

— 

7,853 

17 

7 

19 

43 

— 

— 

— 

— 

— 

— 

— 

— 

— 

— 

51 

— 

$276,715 

306 

648 

3764 

4718 

14 

204 

15 

1695 

130 

12,085 

1372 

56,467 

70,451 

31 

350,334 

^  The  Kumi-ai  churches  and  the  Japan  Mission  are  too  closely  allied  to  permit  of  clear 
separation  in  statistics. 

^  These  statistics  are  largely  those  of  the  previous  year. 


Appendix  II 


OFFICERS   OF  THE  AMERICAN  BOARD 


elected  service  ended 

Presidents 

1810.  John  Treadwell,  1820 

1823.  Rev.  Joseph  Lyman,  1826 

1826.  John  Cotton  Smith,  1841 

1841.  Theo.  Frelinghuysen,  1857 

1857.  Rev.  Mark  Hopkins,  1887 

1887.  Rev.  Richard  S.  Storrs,  1897 

1897.  Rev.  Charles  M.  Lamson,  1899 

1899.  Samuel  B.  Capen.  1 

Vice-Presidents 

1810.  Rev.  Samuel  Spring,  1819 

1819.  Rev.  Joseph  Lyman,  1823 

1823.  John  Cotton  Smith,  1826 

1826.  Stephen  Van  Rensselaer,  1839 

1839.  Theo.  Frelinghuysen,  1841 

1841.  Thomas  S.  Williams,  1857 

1857.  William  Jessup,  1864 

1864.  William  E.  Dodge,  1883 

1883.  Eliphalet  W.  Blatchford,  1897 

1897.  D.  Willis  James,  1900 

1900.  Rev.  Henry  Hopkins,  1906 

1906.  Rev.  Albert  J.  Lyman,  1907 

1907.  Rev.  Henry  C.  King. 

Prudential  Committee 

1810.  William  Bartlett,  1814 

1810.  Rev.  Samuel  Spring,  1819 

1810.  Rev.  Samuel  Worcester,  1821 

1812.  Jeremiah  Evarts,  1830 

1815.  Rev.  Jedediah  Morse,  1821 

1818.  William  Reed,  1834 

1819.  Rev.  Leonard  Woods,  1844 
1821.  Samuel  Hubbard,  1843 
1821.  Rev.  Warren  Fay,  1839 
1828.  Rev.  Benjamin  B.  Wisner,  1835 
1831.  Rev.  Eliaa  Cornelius,  1832 


service  ended 
1850 
1873 
1864 
1846 
1869 
1849 
1850 
1859 


1832.  Samuel  T.  Armstrong, 

1832.  Charles  Stoddard, 

1834.  John  Tappan, 

1835.  Daniel  Noyes, 
1837.  Rev.  Nehemiah  Adams, 
1839.  Rev.  Silas  Aiken, 
1843.  William  W.  Stone, 
1845.  William  J.  Hubbard, 

1849.  Rev.  Augustus  C.  Thompson,    1893 

1850.  William  T.  Eustis,  1868 

1850.  John  Aiken,  1865 

1851.  Daniel  Safford,  1856 
1854.  Henry  Hill,  1865 
1856.  Rev.  Isaac  Ferris,  1857 
1856.  Walter  S.  Griffith,  1870 

1856.  Rev.  Asa  D.  Smith,  1863 

1857.  Alpheus  Hardy,  1886 

1859.  Linus  Child,  1870 

1860.  William  S.  Southworth,  1865 
1863.  Rev.  Albert  Barnes,  1870 
1863.  Rev.  Robert  R.  Booth,  1870 
1865.  Abner  Kingman,  1877 
1865.  Rev.  Andrew  L.  Stone,  1866 

1865.  James  M.  Gordon,  1876 

1866.  Rev.  Rufus  Anderson,  1875 

1868.  Ezra  Farnsworth,  1889 

1869.  Rev.  Edmund  K.  Alden,  1876 

1870.  J.  Russell  Bradford,  1883 
1870.  Joseph  S.  Ropes,  1894 

1875.  Rev.  Egbert  C.  Smyth,  1886 

1876.  Rev.  Edwin  B.  Webb,  1900 
1876.  Charles  C.  Burr,  1900 
1876.  Elbridge  Torrey,  1893 
1878.  Rev.  Isaac  R.  Worcester,  1882 

1882.  Rev.  Albert  H.  Plumb,  1903 

1883.  William  P.  Ellison,  1903 

1884.  Rev.  Charles  F.  Thwing,  1886 
1886.  Rev.  Edward  S.  Atwood,  1888 
1886.  Rev.  Charles  A.  Dickinson,       1892 


1  Member  of  the  Prudential  Committee,  ex  officio. 

498 


APPENDIXES 


499 


ELECTED 

1888.     Rev 


SERVICE    ENDED 

Francis  E.  Clark,  1892 

1889.  G.  Henry  Whitcomb,  1905 

1893.  A.  Lyman  Williston,  1894 

1893.  Rev.  James  G.  Vose,  1899 

1893.  Henry  D.  Hyde,  1897 

1893.  James  M.  W.  Hall,  1905 

1893.  Rev.  John  E.  Tuttle,  1894 

1893.  Rev.  William  W.  Jordan,  1904 

1893.  Rev.  Elijah  Horr,  1904 

1894.  Charles  A.  Hopkins,  1904 
1894.  Rev.  Nehemiah  Boynton,           1899 

1896.  Rev.  William  H.  Davis,  1905 

1897.  Samuel  C.  Darling,  1906 

1899.  Rev.  Edward  C.  IMoore,  1908 

1900.  Rev.  Francis  E.  Clark,  1906 
1900.  Edward  Whitin,  1907 
1903.  Rev.  Arthur  L.  Gillett, 

1903.  Francis  O.  Winslow, 

1904.  Herbert  A.  Wilder, 
1904.  Edward  M.  Noyes, 

1904.  John  Hopkins  Denison, 

1905.  Frederick  Fosdick,  1906 
1905.  Arthur  H.  Wellman, 

1905.  Rev.  Francis  J.  Van  Horn,         1906 

1906.  Charles  A.  Hopkins, 
1906.  Albert  P.  Fitch, 
1906.  Henry  H.  Proctor, 

1906.  Rev.  Edwin  H.  Byington,  1907 

1907.  Rev.  George  A.  Hall, 

1908.  Arthur  Perry, 

1908.  Rev.  Lucius  H.  Thayer. 


Corresponding  Secretaries 

1810.  Rev.  Samuel  Worcester, 

1821.  Jeremiah  Evarts, 

1831.  Rev.  Elias  Cornelius, 

1832.  Rev.  Benjamin  B.  Wisner, 
1832.  Rev.  Rufus  Anderson, 
1832.  Rev.  David  Greene, 
1835.  Rev.  William  J.  Armstrong, 

1847.  Rev.  Selah  B.  Treat, 

1848.  Rev.  Swan  L.  Pomroy, 
1852.  Rev.  George  W.  Wood, 
1865.  Rev.  Nathaniel  G.  Clark, 
1876.  Rev.  Edmund  K.  Alden, 
1880.  Rev.  John  O.  Means, 
1884.  Rev.  Judson  Smith, 

1893.  Rev.  Charles  H.  Daniels, 

1894.  Rev.  James  L.  Barton, 
1904.  Rev.  Cornelius  H.  Patton. 


ELECTED  service    ENDED 

Assistant  Corresponding  Secretaries 

>1824.     Rev.  Rufus  Anderson,  1832 

1828.     Rev.  David  Greene.  1832 


1894. 


1907. 


1906. 
1906. 


1810. 
1843. 
1847. 
1866. 
1881. 


Editorial  Secretaries 

Rev.  Elnathan  E.  Strong 

(Emeritus,  1907), 
Rev.  William  E.  Strong. 

Associate  Secretaries 

Harry  Wade  Hicks, 
Rev.  William  E.  Strong. 

Recording  Secretaries 


1908 
1907 


Rev.  Calvin  Chapin,  1843 

Rev.  Selah  B.  Treat,  1847 

Rev.  Samuel  M.  Worcester,  1866 

Rev.  John  O.  Means,  1881 
Rev.  Henry  A.  Stimson. 


Assistant  Recording  Secretaries 


1836.  Charles  Stoddard, 

1839.  Rev.  Bela  B.  Edwards, 

1842.  Rev.  Daniel  Crosby, 

1888.  Rev.  Edward  N.  Packard. 

Treasurers 


1839 
1842 
1843 


1810. 

Samuel  H.  Walley, 

1811 

1811. 

Jeremiah  Evarts, 

1822 

g 

1822. 

Henry  Hill, 

1854 

1854. 

James  M.  Gordon. 

1865 

1821 

1865. 

Langdon  S.  Ward, 

1895 

1831 

1896. 

Frank  H.  Wiggin. 

1832 

1835 

Assistant  Treasurer 

1866 
1848 

1895. 

Frank  H.  Wiggin. 

1896 

1847 
1877 

Auditors 

1859 

1810. 

Joshua  Goodale, 

1812 

1871 

1812. 

Samuel  H.  Walley, 

1813 

1894 

1813. 

Charles  Walley, 

1814 

1893 

1814. 

Chester  Adams, 

1817 

1883 

1817. 

Ashur  Adams, 

1822 

1906 

1822. 

Chester  Adams, 

1827 

1903 

1827. 

William  Ropes, 

1829 

1829. 

John  Tappan, 

1834 

1829. 

Charles  Stoddard, 

1832 

500 


APPENDIXES 


ELECTED                                                   SERVICE 

ENDED 

1832. 

William  J.  Hubbard, 

1842 

1834. 

Daniel  Noyea, 

1835 

1835. 

Charles  Scudder, 

1847 

1842. 

Moses  L.  Hale, 

1868 

1847. 

Samuel  H.  Walley, 

1876 

1867. 

Joseph  S.  Ropes, 

1870 

1868. 

Thomas  H.  Russell, 

1876 

1870. 

Avery  Plumer, 

1887 

1874. 

Richard  H.  Stearns, 

1875 

1875. 

Elbridge  Torrey, 

1876 

1876. 

James  M.  Gordon, 

1892 

1876. 

Arthur  W.  Tufts, 

1892 

1887. 

Joseph  C.  Tyler, 

1889 

1889. 

Samuel  Johnson, 

1897 

1892. 

Richard  H.  Stearns, 

1896 

1892. 

Edwin  H.  Baker, 

1896. 

Elisha  R.  Brown, 

1901 

1897. 

Henry  E.  Cobb, 

1908 

1901. 

William  B.  Plunkett, 

1908. 

Herbert  J.  Wells. 

APPOINTED  SERVICE  ENDED 

New  York  City 
1854.     Home  Sec.  George  W.  Wood.    1870 

Middle  District 
(Formerly  Central  and  Western  New  York) 


APPOINTED  SERVICE  ENDED 

ASSISTANT  SECRETARIES 


1903.  Harry  Wade  Hicks, 
1906.  Rev.  Enoch  F.  Bell, 
1909.     Rev.  D.  Brewer  Eddy. 


1906 


1863.  Rev.  Charles  P.  Bush, 

1880.  Rev.  Hiram  C.  Haydn, 

1885.  Rev.  William  Kincaid, 

1888.  Rev.  Charles  H.  Daniels, 

1893.  Rev.  Charles  C.  Creegan, 

1909.  Rev.  Willard  L.  Beard. 

Ohio  and  Indiana 

1863.     Rev.  Elisha  Ballantine, 
1866.     Rev.  William  M.  Cheever. 

Philadelphia 
1857.     Rev.  John  McLeod. 


1880 
1884 
1888 
1893 
1909 


1866 
1870 


1870 


District  of  the  Interior 
(Formerly  Northwestern  District) 

1858.     Rev.  Calvin  Clark,  1861 

1864.     Rev.  S.  J.  Humphrey,  1891 

1889.     Rev.  Alverus  N.  Hitchcock. 


DISTRICT  SECRETARIES 

(During  the  last  fifty  years) 
Northern  New  England 
1856.     Rev.  William  Warren. 

Southern  New  England 

1862.     Rev.  Jonathan  L.  Jenkins, 
1864.     Rev.  John  P.  Skeele. 


1878 


1863 
1870 


Work  in  Nominally  Christian  Lands 

1872.     Rev.  Joseph  Emerson,  1875 

1875.     Rev.  Luther  H.  Gulick.  1876 

District  of  the  Pacific  Coast  (1903) 
1903.     Rev.  H.  Melville  Tenney. 

Field  Secretary  (1888) 
1888.     Rev.  Charles  C.  Creegan.  1893 


Appendix    III 

INSTITUTIONS    FOUNDED    OR    INSPIRED    BY   THE 

AMERICAN  BOARD  OR  ITS  MISSIONARIES  AND 

NOW  IN  OPERATION  BY  ITS  MISSIONS  OR 

IN  FRIENDLY  ALLIANCE  Y^^ITH  THEM 

Several  of  the  lists  here  presented  are  quite  incomplete; 
some  conspicuously  so,  as,  for  example,  the  kindergartens.  It 
has  been  impossible  to  secure  full  data  for  the  purpose. 
Moreover,  it  has  been  impracticable  to  include  all  institutions 
on  the  Board's  fields.  A  full  list  of  the  schools  of  boarding, 
high,  and  village  grades  would  in  itself  require  pages  of  space. 
But  what  is  presented  may  serve  to  indicate  the  number  and 
variety  of  organized  and  estabhshed  agencies  by  which  Chris- 
tianity is  being  \vrought  into  the  life  of  the  lands  where  the 
Board  has  carried  it. 

COLLEGES 

North  China  College  (Union),  Tung-chou,  China. 
North  China  Union  Woman's  College,  Peking,  China. 
Foochow  College,  Foochow,  China, 
Foochow  Girls'  College,  Ponasang,  China. 
Lockhart  Medical  College  (Union),  Peking,  China. 
American  College,  Madura,  India. 
Jaffna  College,  Jaffna,  Ceylon. 
Doshisha,  Kyoto,  Japan. 
Kobe  College,  Kobe,  Japan. 
International  Institute  for  Girls,  Madrid,  Spain. 
Syrian  Protestant  College,  Beirut,  Syria. 
Central  Turkey  College,  Aintab,  Turkey. 
Euphrates  College,  Harpoot,  Turkey. 
Anatolia  College,  Marsovan,  Turkey. 
Robert  College,  Constantinople,  Turkey. 
American  College  for  Girls,  Constantinople,  Turkey. 
Central  Turkey  Girls'  College,  Marash,  Turkey. 
St.  Paul's  Institute,  Tarsus,  Turkey. 
International  Institute,  Smyrna,  Turkey. 
501 


502  APPENDIXES 


THEOLOGICAL  SEMINARIES 

Union  Theological  School,  Impolweni,  Africa. 

Foochow  Theological  Seminary,  Foochow,  China. 

North  China  Theological  Seminary  (Union),  Peking,  China. 

Canton  Training  School  (Union),  Canton,  China. 

Marathi  Mission  Theological  Seminary,  Ahmednagar,  India. 

Madura  Mission  Theological  Seminary,  Pasumalai,  India. 

Theological  Department,  Jaffna  College,  Jaffna,  Ceylon. 

Theological  Department,  Doshisha,  Kyoto,  Japan. 

Theological  Department,  Colegio  Internacional,  Guadalajara,  Mexico. 

Kusaie  Training  School,  Kusaie,  Micronesia. 

Collegiate  and  Theological  Institute,  Samokov,  Bulgaria. 

Western  Turkey  Theological  Seminary,  Marsovan,  Turkey. 

Central  Turkey  Theological  Seminary,  Marash,  Turkey. 

Eastern  Turkey  Theological  Seminary,  Harpoot,  Turkey. 

Training  School  for  Pastors,  Mardin,  Turkey. 

HOSPITALS 

Chisamba,  Kamundongo,  Mt.  Silinda,  and  Durban,  Africa. 

Tung-chou,  Pang-Chuang,  Lintsing,  Foochow,  Ponasang,  Shao-wu,  Ing-hok, 

Taiku,  and  Fen-cho-fu,  China. 
Ahmednagar  (Hospital  for  Women  and  Girls),  Wai,  and  Madura  (Albert 

Victor  Hospital  and  Women's  Hospital),  India. 
Manepay    (Green    Memorial    Hospital),    Inuvil    (McLeod    Hospital    for 

Women  and^Children),  and  Karadive  (Branch  of  Green  Memorial), 

Ceylon. 
Davao,  Philippine  Islands. 
Van,  Erzroom,  Mardin,  Diarbekir,  Harpoot  (Annie  Tracy  Riggs  Memorial 

Hospital),  Marsovan,    Sivas,   Talas    (American   Christian   Hospital), 

Adana,  and  Aintab  (Azariah  Smith  Hospital),  Turkey. 

DISPENSARIES 

Bailundu,  Chisamba,  Ochileso,  Kamundongo,  Chikore,  Mt.  SiUnda,  and 
Durban,  Africa. 

Peking,  Tung-chou,  Pang-Chuang,  Lintsing,  Foochow,  Ponasang,  Ing-hok, 
Shao-wu,  Taiku,  and  Fen-cho-fu,  China. 

Bombay,  Ahmednagar,  Rahuri,  Vadala,  Sholapur,  Wai,  Madura,  Pasuma- 
lai, Battalagundu,  Melur,  Aruppukottai,  and  Dii^digul,  India. 

Manepay,  Inuvil,  and  Karadive,  Ceylon. 


APPENDIXES  503 

Nauru,  Micronesia. 
Davao,  Philippine  Islands. 

Sivas,   Talas,    Marsovan,   Van,   Erzroom,    Mardin,   Harpoot,   Diarbekir, 
Aintab,  and  Adana,  Turkey. 


INDUSTRIAL  SCHOOLS 

Amanzimtoti  and  Mt.  Silinda,  Africa. 

Ahmednagar  (Sir  D.  M.  Petit  Industrial  School),  Bombay,  Vadala,  Sirur 

(Sir  D.  M.  Petit  Industrial  School),  Sholapur,  and  Pasumalai,  India. 
Tellippallai,  Ceylon. 
Sivas,  Salonica,  Marsovan,  Samokov,  Harpoot,  Bardezag,  Oorfa,  and  Aintab, 

Turkey. 
Industrial  work  is  maintained  in  all  African  missions,  in  boarding  schools 

in  India  and  Ceylon,  and  in  orphanages  in  Turkey. 


KINDERGARTENS 

Peking,  Tung-chou,  Pang-Chuang,  and  Foochow,  China. 
Ahmednagar  and  Sholapur,  India. 

Kyoto,  Maebashi,  Kobe,  Tottori,  and  Miyazaki,  Japan. 
Chihuahua  and  Parral,  Mexico. 

Van,  Mardin,  Harpoot,  Erzroom,  Talas,  and  Cesarea,  Turkey. 
Sofia,  Bulgaria. 

Kindergartens  are  provided  in  connection  with  many  other  schools  in 
almost  all  fields. 

PHILANTHROPIC  ORGANIZATIONS 

Orphanages  in  Bombay,  India;  Okayama,  Kobe,  Maebashi,  and  Tottori, 
Japan;  Van,  Erzroom,  Harpoot,  Aintab,  Marash,  Oorfa,  Adana, 
Bardezag,  Brousa,  and  Sivas,  Turkey. 

Homes  for  famine  boys  and  girls  in  Ahmednagar,  Rahuri,  Vadala,  Sholapur, 
Satara,  and  Wai,  India. 

Schools  for  the  Blind  in  Bombay,  India,  and  Kobe,  Japan. 

Homes  for  Widows,  Ahmednagar  and  Wai,  India. 

Leper  asylum,   Sholapur,   India. 

Homes  for  ex-convicts  in  Tokyo,  Kobe,  Osaka,  and  Akiyoshi,  Japan. 

Home  for  Unfortunate  Girls,  Miyazaki,  Japan. 

Hanabatake  Social  Settlement,  Okayama,  Japan. 

Factory  Girls'  I^nae,  Matsuyama,  Japan. 

School  for  Wayward  Boys,  Tokyo,  Japan. 


504  APPENDIXES 

SPECIAL   TRAINING   SCHOOLS 

Normal  Training  School,  Amanzimtoti,  Africa. 

Normal  Schools  at  Ahmednagar,   Pasumalai,  and   Madm-a,   India,   and 

Sivas,  Turkey. 
Normal  Department  in  Chihuahua,  Mexico. 
Bible  Women's  Training  Schools   at  Ahmednagar   and   Madura,  India; 

Kobe,  Japan;  Foochow  and  Pagoda  Anchorage,  China. 
Kindergarten  Teachers'  Training  Schools  at  Sholapur,  India;  Kobe,  Japan; 

Smyrna,  Turkey. 
Nurses'  Training    Schools  at  Foochow,    Ponasang,    and   Peking,    China; 

Madura,    Ahmednagar,    and    Wai,    India;     Inuvil,    Ceylon;     Van, 

Marsovan,  Cesarea,  Aintab,  and  Harpoot,  Turkey. 


INDEX 


Abbott,   Dr.  and  Mrs.  J.  E.,  416, 

418. 

Abeel,  David,  108,  114,  116,  120. 

Abeih,  99,  205. 

Abenaqui   Mission,   46,    186. 

Adabazar,     102,     106. 

Adams,  Dr.  and  Mrs.  Newton,  134, 
135. 

Adams,  Miss  A.  P.,  355. 

Adams,  Rev.  and  Mrs.  E.  A.,  297, 
463,  468. 

Adams,    Nehemiah,    307. 

Adana,    410,    411. 

Adolescence,  period  of,  140;  day  of 
small  things,  140;  feeling  its  way, 
142;  missionary  motive,  143; 
Cornwall  School,  144;  agencies 
and  auxiliaries,  145;  financial 
problem,  146;  Missionary  Herald, 
148;  public  meetings,  149;  stim- 
ulus to  others,  150;  mother  of 
five,  151;  comity  in  missions, 
151;  growth  from  1810-50,  153; 
inclusive  organization,  154;  an 
opening  world,  155;  missionary 
force,  156;  development  of  mis- 
sionary pohcy,  157;  missionary 
organization,  158;  mission  growth, 
159;  superb  leaders,  160. 

Advance,  416. 

^gean  Sea,  87. 

Afghanistan,  156. 

Africa,  attempting,  124;  a  forbid- 
ding land,  124;  first  move,  124; 
staking  out  the  field,  125;  a 
disappointed  hope,  127;  opening 
the  Gaboon  Mission  (1843),  128; 


pressing  on,  129;  French  aggres- 
sion, 129;  the  outlook,  130;  Zulu 
Mission  begun  (1835),  132; 
characteristics  of  Zulus,  133; 
plan  of  the  mission,  133;  second 
step,  135;  third  attempt,  136; 
setting  down  to  work,  136;  win- 
ning their  way,  137;  more  rapid 
growth,  138;  the  outlook  in  1850, 
138.  (See  also  Dark  Continent, 
in  the,  New  Fields  and  Southern 
and  Central  Africa.) 

African  Congregational  Church,  429. 

Agricultural  and  Industrial  Insti- 
tute, 403. 

Ahualulco,  302. 

Ahmednagar,  29,  166,  329,  414,  416, 
418,  424,  479. 

Aintab,  106,  197,  198,  224,  319,  327, 
388,  393,  395,  397,  398,  399,  405, 
478. 

Aintab,   Girls'   Seminary,  222. 

Aitchison,  William,  252. 

Ak  Hissar,  392. 

Albania,  389. 

Albany,  169. 

Albert  Victor  Hospital,  422. 

Albrecht,  G.  E.,  362. 

Alden,  E.  K.,  307,  332. 

Aleppo,  106. 

Alexander,  Rev.  and  Mrs.W.  S.,  292. 

Allevia,  295. 

Almanac,  American  Board,  485. 

Alpine  Mission,  466. 

Amanzimtoti,  329,  429;  Seminary, 
284,  286,  427,  433,  435. 

Ament,  Dr.  W.  S.,  375,  379. 

American  and  Foreign  Christian 
Union,  290,  291,  292. 


505 


506 


INDEX 


American  Bible  Society,  222. 

American  Board  —  How  the  Board 
began,  3;  conference  at  Andover, 
3;  the  Bradford  meeting,  4;  earlier 
influences,  7;  ardor  and  caution, 
9;  appointment  of  first  mission- 
aries, 13;  their  ordination,  13; 
their  departure,  15;  124,  140,  141, 
142,  145,  146,  150,  153,  159,  160, 
229,  230,  305,  308,  485,  486. 

American  College  for  Girls,  389. 

American  Methodist  Mission,  384. 

American  Missionary  Association, 
53,  116,  195,  348,  384,  396. 

Amoy,  113,  119,  250. 

Anatoha  College,  391,  404. 

Anderson,  Lady,  397. 

Anderson,  Secretary  Rufus,  88, 100, 
104,  166,  307,  316,  320. 

Andover,  Mass.,  3. 

"Andover   Controversy,"   330. 

Andrews,  Miss  M.  E.,  372. 

Anti-opium  decree,  380. 

Anti-slavery,  52,  53. 

Apaiang,  239. 

Arabkir,  106,  406. 

Arabs,  Bedouin,  99. 

Arch,  John,  37. 

Arkansas  Mission,  39. 

Armenia,  197,  385. 

Armenia  College,  224,  327.  (See 
also  Euphrates  College.) 

Armenian  Church,  First  Evangeli- 
cal, 105. 

Armenian  Relief  Committee  of 
America,  396,  397. 

Armeno-Turkish,  Old  Testament, 
translation  of,  103. 

Arms,  William,  156. 

Arthington,  Robert,  288. 

Aruppokottai,  421. 

Asaad  es  Shidiak,  84,  85. 

Assyrian  Mission,  209,  211. 

Athens,  101. 

Atkinson,  J.  L.,  274. 

Atwood,  Dr.  I.  J.,  380. 

Atwood,  Miss  Harriet,  14. 


Austria,  463.  (See  also  Christian 
lands,  in  nominally,  and  Papal 
lands. ) 

Avedaper,  200. 


B 


Babajee,  29. 

Bagster,  W.  W.,  337,  338,  339. 

Baikwa  School,  276. 

Bailundos,  336. 

Bailundu,  337,  340,  437,  438,  439. 

Bakeles,  279. 

Balbodhmewa,  422. 

Baldwin,  T.  A.,  223;  Rev.  and  Mrs. 
C.  C,  260;  the  Misses,  453. 

Ball,  Dr.  Dyer,  122. 

Ballantine,  Dr.  W.  0.,  417,  422. 

Bangalore,  425. 

Bangkok,  114,  115. 

Bansko,  214. 

Baptism,  change  of  views  concern- 
ing, 19. 

Baptist   Missionary   Society,    19. 

Baptist  Missionary  Union,  150. 

Barcelona,  293,  426,  462. 

Bardwell,  Horatio,  22,  23. 

Barnum,  H.  N.,  220,  398. 

Barrows,  J.  H.,  415. 

Bartlett,  Wm.,  Esq.,  6. 

Barton,  Secretary  J.  L.,  360,  383, 
420. 

Batak  country,  117. 

Bates,  Rev.  and  Mrs.  F.  W.,  342, 
343. 

Bath,  Marquis  of,  214. 

Batticotta,  27,  28. 

Bebek,  103,  106,  199,  217,  328. 

Bedouin  Arabs,  99. 

Beirut,  82,  98,  99,  100,  101,  205. 

Benguella,  337. 

Bequests,  Mrs.  Mary  Norris,  13; 
Otis,  Asa,  315;  Phelps,  Anson  G., 
314;  Swett,  Samuel  W.,  325. 

Berry,  Dr.  and  Mrs.  J.  C,  265,  266, 
275,  277,  355. 

Betanie,  464. 


INDEX 


507 


Biarritz,  459,  460. 

Bible  House,  221. 

Bible  lands,  reentering,  80;  a  new- 
crusade,  80;  the  land  to  be 
possessed,  80;  spying  it  out 
(1820),  81;  Syrian  Mission,  83; 
printing  house  at  Malta,  85; 
presses  transferred,  86;  reaching 
the  Greeks,  87;  relocating  fields  in 
Turkey,  88;  tour  of  Smith  and 
Dwight  (1830),  88;  Constanti- 
nople at  last,  89;  beginning 
among  Armenians,  91;  a  quick 
impression,  92;  persecution  begins 
(1839),  93;  Nestorian  Mission 
(1834),  94;  the  outlook,  94;  moun- 
tain Nestorians,  95;  progress  in 
Urumia,  97;  return  to  Syria  (1830), 
98;  Druzes  of  the  Lebanon,  99; 
seeing  results  at  last,  100;  Dr. 
King  in  Greece,  101;  Armenian 
reformation  (1840-50),  102;  tested 
by  fire  (1844),  104;  excommu- 
nication, 105;  first  Protestant 
church  organized  (1846),  105; 
spread  of  evangelicalism,  106; 
looking  backward,  106.  (  See  also 
Turkey  and  the  Levant  and  Nearer 
East,  the.) 

Bible  societies,  309. 

Bible  Teaching  Band,  364. 

Bible  women,  181,  222. 

Bibles,  burning  of,  295. 

Bihe,  336,  337. 

Bihenos,  336. 

Bilbao,  457. 

Bingham,  Rev.  and  Mrs.  Hiram,  57, 
61,  67;  Rev.  and  Mrs.  Hiram 
Bingham,  Jr.,  236,  238,  242,  441, 
448,  453. 

Bird,  Miss  Isabella,  73. 

Bird,  Miss  Susan,  378. 

Bird,  Rev.  and  Mrs.  Isaac,  83,  88. 

Bissell,  Rev.  and  Mrs.  H.  M.,  298; 
Dr.  JuHa,  422,  468,  470. 

Bithynia  High  School,  404. 

Bithynia  Union,  220. 


Bitlis,  392,  393. 

Black,  Rev.  and  Mrs.  R.  F.,  454. 

Blatchford,  E.  W.,  490. 

Bleeker  Street  Church,  N.  Y., 
109. 

"Blind  Bartimeus,"  75. 

Blodget,  Henry,  252,  260. 

Bohemia,  297,  463. 

Bombay,  18,  24,  34,  329,  416,  422. 

Bombay,  Christian  Alliance,  182. 

Bombay,  First  Church  in,  424. 

Bombay,  Missionary  Union,  25. 

Bonney,  Mrs.  S.  W.,  257. 

Borneo,  Dyaks  of,  118;  end  of  mis- 
sion, 119. 

Bowker,  Mrs.  Albert,  311. 

Boxers,  374. 

Bradford,  Rev.  A.  H.,  360. 

Bradford,  J.  R.,  307. 

Bradford,  Mass.,  3,  4. 

Bradley,  Dr.  D.  E.,  114,  115,  116. 

Brainerd,  station  at,  36. 

"Brethren,  The,"  7. 

Brewer,  Rev.  Josiah,  87. 

Bridgman,  Rev.  E.  C,  108,  109,  110, 
111,  121,  122,  252,  256. 

Bridgman  School,  370,  371. 

Brigham,  J.  C,  290. 

British  India  and  Ceylon,  165;  new 
period,  165;  new  method  re- 
quired, 165;  deputation  of  1854- 
55,  166;  restricting  the  schools, 
167;  establishing  native  church, 
168;  board's  approval,  168;  effect 
in  India,  169;  the  bearing  in 
Ceylon,  170;  Arcot  Mission  (1851), 
172;  good  witnesses,  172;  strug- 
gle with  caste,  174;  substantial 
growth,  174;  developing  native 
leadership,  175;  revival  in  Ma- 
dura (1860-61),  176;  develop- 
ment of  mission,  176;  upbuilding 
in  Ceylon  (1860),  178;  Madras 
closed  (1866),  180;  woman's  work 
for  w^oman,  180;  spirit  of  union, 
182;  widening  influence,  182; 
famine  and  harvest,   183.      (See 


508 


INDEX 


also  India  and   Ceylon,  starting 

in,  and  Southern  Asia.) 
Brookline,  Mass.,  263. 
Brooklyn,  N.  Y.,  454,  492. 
Broosa,  88,  223,  393. 
Browne,  J.  K.,  399. 
Bruin  Press,  109. 
Briinn,  298,  465,  467. 
Bryan,  Minister,  439. 
Buckingham,  Governor,  193. 
Buenos  Ayres,  155,  290. 
Bulgaria,  212,  214,  389. 
Bulgarian  Bible  Dictionary,  401. 
Bulgarian  Evangelical  Society,  390. 
Bunker,  Rev.  and  Mrs.  F.  R.,  343, 

436. 
Burma,  19. 

Burr,  C.  C,  Esq.,  194. 
Bush,  Miss  C.  E.,  386. 
Bushnell,  Rev.  Albert,  279. 
Butler,  Elizur,  44,  45. 
Butrick,  D.  S.,  40. 
Byington,  Rev.  and  Mrs.  T.  L.,  212. 


Calcutta  University,  424. 
Calhoun,  Simeon,  99,  203,  310. 
Canadian    Congregationalists,    333. 
Cannibalism,  231,  246. 
Canning,  Sir  Stratford,  104. 
Canton,  113,  122,  253,  257,  349,  382. 
Cape  Palmas,  125,  126,  127,  128. 
Cape  Town,  136. 
Capen,  S.  B.,  490. 
Caravan,  sailing  of,  15,  16. 
Caroline,  sailing  of,  232. 
Caroline  Islands,  239,  240,  450. 
Cary,  Rev.  and  Mrs.  Otis,  277,  362. 
Case,  Rev.  and  Mrs.  H.  E.  B.,  451. 
Caste,  obstacles  of,  21,  174. 
Caswell,  Rev.  Jesse,  114,  115,  116. 
Cathcart,  Miss  L.  S.,  440. 
CathoHc  ladies,  junta  of,  294. 
Central  Board  of  Foreign  Missions, 

151. 
Central  Turkey  College,  224,  319, 

327. 


Central  Turkey  Mission,  386,  388. 

Central  Union  Church,  Honolulu, 
452. 

Cesarea,  200,  393. 

Ceylon,  17,  22,  26,  27,  28,  170,  171, 
178,  327. 

Chaka,  132. 

Champion,  George,  134. 

Channell,  Miss  M.  A.,  451. 

Channon,  Rev.  and  Mrs.  I.  M.,  448, 
452. 

Chapin,  Rev.  Calvin,  6;  F.  M.,  370. 

Chapin  Home,  416, 

Cherokees,  36,  46,  186,  187. 

Chicago,  318. 

Chickasaws,  43,  46. 

Chihuahua,  350,  471,  473.. 

Chikore,  345,  436. 

Child,  Linus,  307. 

Chi-h,  370,  374,  380,  381. 

China,  edging  into,  108;  the  call 
(1828),  108;  mission  begun  (1830), 
108;  opening  of  work,  109;  medi- 
cal arm  (1834),  109;  a  dark  pros- 
pect, 110;  tours  of  exploration 
(1836),  111;  missionaries'  patience, 
112;  opium  war  (1840),  113; 
Siam  (1831),  114;  located  and  at 
work,  115;  winning  royal  favor, 
115;  transfer  of  the  mission 
(1850),  116;  exploring  the  East 
Indies  (1833-34),  116;  tour  of 
Sumatra  (1834),  117;  a  try  at 
Borneo,  118;  Borneo  Mission 
under  way  (1838),  118;  enlarge- 
ment in  China,  119;  growing  pres- 
tige, 121;  slow  progress,  121.  In 
the  empire  of,  250;  the  door  opens 
hard,  250;  a  disturbed  country, 
250;  Shanghai  opened  (1854), 
251;  Canton  closed,  253;  a  new 
era  (1860),  254;  Christianity's 
share  in  the  change,  254;  the  call 
of  the  hour,  255;  North  China  at 
last,  256;  in  the  South,  257;  into 
the  interior  (1870),  258;  fanatic 
outbreaks  recur,  259;  steady  gains 


INDEX 


509 


(1870-80),  260;  the  door  of  fam- 
ine, 261.  (See  also  New  Fields 
and  Farther  East,  the.) 

Chinese  leprosy,  228. 

Chinese  Repository,  109. 

Chisamba,  340,  438. 

Chiyuka,  438. 

Choctaws,  38,  186,  187. 

Christian  Alliance,  Bombay,  182. 

Christian  Choctaws,  45,  46. 

Christian  Endeavor,  415,  461,  492. 

Christian    Endeavor    Society    of 
China,  480. 

Christian  Endeavor  Society  of  Mex- 
ico, 470. 

Christian  Herald,  402,  417. 

Christian  lands,  in  nominally,  290; 
early  purpose,  290;  four  missions 
undertaken,  290;  the  attempt  in 
Italy  (1873),  292;  beginning  in 
Spain,  292;  in  the  face  of  perse- 
cution, 294;  a  good  accomplish- 
ment, 296;  beginning  in  Austria, 
297;  driven  to  relocate,  298;  a 
purer  type,  299;  mission  to  Mex- 
ico, 300;  at  Guadalajara,  301; 
at  Monterey,  302;  assassination 
of  Mr.  Stephens,  302;  the  need  of 
trained  workers,  303.  (See  also 
Papal  lands.) 

Christian  Vernacular  Education 
Society,  179. 

Christian  Witness,  422. 

Church  Missionary  Society,  424. 

Churchill,  D.  C,  418. 

Cihcia,  399,  410. 

Cincinnati,  318. 

Ciudad  Juarez,  471. 

Clark,  Miss  E.  C,  403. 

Clark,  E.  W.,  79;  Secretary  N.  G., 
231,  307,  319,  328;  Rev.  and  Mrs. 
A.  W.,  297,  298,  299,  463,  464, 
465,  468. 

Cleveland,  492. 

Coan,  Rev.  and  Mrs.  Titus,  61,  70, 
71,  73,  78,  156,  231. 

Cochran,  J.  G.,   205. 


Coffing,  J.  G.,  215. 
Colegio  Chihuahuonse,  471. 
Colenso,  Bishop,  284. 
College  Hall,  379. 

Collegiate    and    Theological    Insti- 
tute, 213. 
Committee  of  Nine,  483. 
Committee  on  Extra  Gifts,  483. 
"Company  of  the  New  Covenant," 

275. 
Conger,  U.  S.  Minister,  376. 
Congregational  Association,  Dakota, 

193. 
Congregational  Brotherhood,  493. 
Congregational  Education  Society, 

472. 
Congregational    Home     Missionary 

Society,  463. 
Congregational  Work,  485. 
Congregationalist,  416. 
Connecticut,  8. 
Constantine,  Mr.,  202. 
Constantinople,  222,  385,  387,   388, 

392,  393,  405,  410. 
Constantinople  Bible  House,  221. 
Constantinople    Christian    College, 

217. 
Constantinople  Home,  327. 
Cooperating  churches,  309. 
Cooperating   committees,   484. 
Corbin,  Mr.  and  Mrs.  P.  L.,  381. 
Cornwall  School,  144. 
Crawford,  Rev.  and  Mrs.  M.  A., 

468. 
Creek  Indians,  46. 
Currie,  W.  T.,  340,  438. 
Curse,  by  Maronite  patriarch,  98, 

99. 
Cyprus,  87. 


Dairyman's  Daughter,  86,  93. 
Dakota  Indians,  46,  191,  194. 
Dakota  Mission,  195. 
Dakotas,  in  the  land  of  the,   186; 
reduction  of  Indian  Missions,  186; 


510 


INDEX 


the  Dakota  field,  188;  the  Sioux 
war  (1862),  189;  the  church  in 
prison  and  in  camp,  190;  the 
reestabUshed  mission,  192;  church 
fellowship,  193;  more  Indian  ex- 
periments, 193;  maturing  work, 
194.  (See  also  Indian  Trails,  fol- 
lowing.) 

Damon,  Rev.  F.  W.,  445. 

Dark  Continent,  in  the,  279;  the 
Gaboon  Mission,  279;  its  trans- 
fer in  1870,  280;  the  Zulu  Mis- 
sion (1850),  281;  still  slow  and 
discouraging,  281;  mission  re- 
serves (1856),  283;  working  hard, 
284;  a  cheering  decade  (1860- 
70),  285;  broadening  the  field, 
287;  tugging  along,  288.  (See  also 
Africa,  attempting.  New  Fields 
and  Southern  and  Central  Africa.) 

Davenport,  Iowa,  191. 

Davis,  Dr.  and  Mrs.  J.  D.,  265,  269, 
270,  273,  362. 

Day  of  Prayer,  150. 

Day  spring,  149. 

De  Forest,  J.  H.,  274,  365. 

Delaporte,  Rev.  and  Mrs.  P.  A.,  452. 

Dennis,  J.  S.,  334,  378. 

Der  Heratoon,  222. 

Des  Moines,  330. 

Deutsche  Hulfsbund,  406. 

Diamond  Jubilee,  Madura,  491. 

Diarbekir,  209,  406. 

Dingaan,  133,  135. 

Dionysius,  Bishop,  84,  87. 

District  agencies,  484. 

Dnyanodaya,  422. 

Doane,  Rev.  and  'Mrs.  E.  T.,  233, 
441,  446. 

Dodd,  E.  M.,  198. 

Dodge,  W.  E.,  306. 

Dohne,  287. 

Dolphin,  65. 

Doshisha,  272,  273,  353,  356,  361. 

Doty,  Elihu,  120,  251. 

Doughty- WyUe,  Major  C.  H.  M., 
412. 


Druzes,  99,  100,  101,  204. 

Dube,  James,  286. 

Du  Chaillu,  Paul,  280. 

Dudley,  Miss  J.  E.,  270. 

Dunmore,  G.  W.,  200,  210,  211. 

Durban,  429,  431,  433. 

Dutch  Reformed  Church,  150,  151. 

Dwight,  Timothy,  6;  H.  G.  O.,  88, 

90,  91,  93,  103,  215. 
Dwight,  station  at,  39. 
Dyaks,  118. 


E 


East  Central  Africa,  341.  (See  also 
Southern  and  Central  Africa.) 

Eastern  Turkey,  211,  387. 

Eaton,  President  E.  D.,  373. 

Eaton,  Rev.  and  Mrs.  J.  D.,  350, 
471. 

Ebina,  Danjo,  367. 

Ecumenical  Conference,  N.  Y.,  482. 

Eddy,  G.  S.,  419. 

Edinburgh  Conference,  482. 

Edwards,  Mrs.  M.  K.,  286. 

Eels,  Gushing,  52. 

Elbasan,  409. 

Eliot,  mission  station,  38. 

Ellis,  Rev.  William,  62,  230. 

Ellison,  Hon.  W.  P.,  360. 

El  Paso,  472. 

Elphinstone,  Lord,  173. 

El  Progreso,  471. 

El  Testigo,  470. 

Ely  Volume,  486. 

Emhuscade,  75. 

Emerson,  Rev.  J.  S.,  241. 

Engonyameni,  431,  432. 

' '  Enlightened  Party, "  22 1 . 

Envelope  series,  485. 

Enver  Bey,  408. 

Erickson,  Rev.  and  Mrs.  C.  T., 
409. 

Erzroom,  102,  392,  393. 

Esidumbini,  434. 

Eski  Zaghra,  213. 

Ethiopian  movement,  430. 


INDEX 


511 


Euphrates  College,  224,  399,  406, 
409.     (See  also  Armenia  College.) 

Eustis,  W.  T,  307. 

Evangelical  Society  of  Geneva,  457. 

Evangelical  Union,  92,  220. 

Evangelists'  School,  465. 

Evans,  Miss  J.  G.,  372. 

Evarts,  Jeremiah,  3,  4,  6,  140. 

Everett,  Edward,  201. 

Everett,  Mrs.  J.  S.,  222. 

Expansion,  period  of,  325;  in  in- 
come and  outgo,  325;  in  admin- 
istration, 326;  in  comprehensive- 
ness, 330;  in  organization,  332; 
in  aim,  334. 


Factory  Girls'  Home,  Matsuyama, 
355. 

Farmington,  Conn.,  9. 

Farnsworth,  Ezra,  307. 

Farther  East,  the,  352;  Japan  — 
years  of  swift  increase  to  1888, 
352;  theater  services,  352;  an 
awakened  empire,  353;  still  op- 
position and  interference,  353; 
alUed  lines  of  work,  355;  the 
climax  reached,  356 ;  the  re- 
action in  the  next  decade,  357; 
official  opposition,  360;  *the  Do- 
shisha  trouble,  360;  growth  under 
difficulty,  362;  the  reawakening, 
363;  change  in  government  atti- 
tude, 365;  effect  of  Russian  war, 
365;  readjustment  for  advance, 
366;  China  —  the  time  for  ad- 
vance, 368;  broadening  lines  of 
work,  369;  effect  of  war  with 
Japan  (1894-95),  371;  the  Box- 
ers, 374;  their  backing,  374;  the 
massacres,  375;  massacre  in 
Shansi,  377;  collapse  at  last  of 
the  Boxer  movement,  378;  re- 
construction, 379;  a  decade  of 
marvelous  advance,  380;  union 
movements,  383.    (See  also  China, 


into,    Japan    and    New 

Fields.) 
Favre,  Leopold,  397. 
Fen-cho-fu,  346,  348,  377. 
Ferdinand,  Prince,  390. 
Fiske,  Miss  Fidelia,  97. 
Fiske,  PUny,  80,  81,  82. 
Flathead  Indians,  46. 
Fletcher,  Miss  J.  E.,  440,  449. 
Foochow,  113,  120,  257,  259,  368, 

370,  372,  373,  382,  480. 
Ford,  Dr.  H.  A.,  280. 
Foreign  Missionary  Society  of  the 

Western  Reserve,  150. 
Fort  Berthold,  192. 
Fort  Snelling,  190,  191. 
Fort  Sully,  192. 
Forward  Movement,  364,  484. 
Free  Church  of  Scotland,  309. 
Free  Church  Seminary,  435. 
Free  Reformed  Church  of  Austria, 

463. 
Free  Reformed  Church  of  Bohemia, 

299. 
Frelinghuysen,  Theodore,  153,  306. 
Frere,  Sir  Bartle,  173. 
Fukien,  369,  382. 
Fukuin-sha,  355. 
Fukuzawa,  Mr.,  354,  357. 
Fuller,  C.  C,  435. 


Gaboon  Mission,  276,  281. 

Gaboon  River,  128,  129,  130. 

Garguilo,  402. 

Gates,  L.  S.,  418. 

Gazaland,  435. 

Geog  Tapa,  97. 

George,  son  of  king  of  Kauai,  64. 

Gifts,  Harris,  J.  N.,  357;  James,  D. 

Willis,    483;    Rockefeller,    John 

D.,  488. 
Gilbert  Islands,  246. 
Gilson,  Miss  H.  J.,  436. 
Glory  Kindergarten,  Kobe,  355. 
Godavari  Valley,  169. 


.12 


INDEX 


Goodell,  William,    15,   36,  83,   84, 

85,  88,  90,  92,  103,  322. 
Goodenough,  H.  D.,  428,  432. 
Goodrich,  Chauncy,  370. 
Gordon,  M.  L.,  265,  268,  269,  310, 

362;  J.  M.,  307. 
Gordon  Theological  Seminary,  372. 
Gould,  Miss  A.  A.,  377. 
Grant,   Dr.   and   Mrs.   Asahel,   94, 

95,  96. 
Grant,  Sir  Charles,  18. 
Gratz,  298,  464. 
Greece,  201. 

Greek  Evangelical  Alliance,  389. 
Green,  Dr.  S.  F.,  179. 
Green,  J.  S.,  49. 
Greene,  Rev.  and  Mrs.  D.  C.,  265, 

269,  278,  357. 
Greene,  Rev.  F.  D.,  396. 
Grey,  Sir  George,  284. 
Greycloud,  Rev.  David,  194. 
Gridley,  Rev.  Elnathan,  87. 
Griffin,  E.  D.,  4. 
Grout,  Aldin,  134,  135,  137;  Lewis, 

138,  281,  285,  287. 
Guadalajara,    300,    301,    303,    468, 

469,  470,  471,  472. 
Guess,  George,  40. 
Guinea  Coast,  125. 
Gulick,  Rev.  and  Mrs.  L.  H.,  231, 

232,  292,  293;  Rev.  and  Mrs.  O. 

H.,  265,  266,  268,  445;  Rev.  and 

Mrs.  W.  H.,  296,  456,  457,  458, 

459,  460,  461,  462;  Rev.  and  Mrs. 

T.  L.,  296,  456. 
Gungunyana,  Chief,  342. 
Gutzlaff,  Karl,  111,  112,  114. 


H 


Hadjin,  396,  397,  411. 
Hager,  Dr.  C.  R.,  349. 
Hale,  Secretary,  5. 
Hall,   12,    13,   19,    22,   24,   25,  26 
Gordon,  C.  L.,  192;  C.  C,  415. 
Hamidieh,  387. 


Hamlin,  Cyrus,  103,  199,  212,  217, 

328. 
Hanabatake,  355. 
Harada,  President  T.,  367. 
Hardy,  Alpheus,  307. 
Harmony,  15,  16. 
Harpoot,  200,  217,  320,  327,  386, 

388,  394,  396,  397,  406. 
Harris,  Hon.  J.  N.,  357. 
Harris,  Hon.  Townsend,  264. 
Harris,  Prof,  and  Mrs.  J.  R.,  396. 
Hartford,  Conn.,  492. 
Hasbeiya,  100,  101,  202. 
Haseltine,  Miss  Ann,  14. 
Haseltine,  Deacon  John,  14. 
Haskeay,  389. 
Haskell,  E.  B.,  400. 
Haskins,  Miss  B.  M.,  471. 
Hatti  Plumayoun,  196. 
Hawaii,  321. 
Hawaiian  Bible,  78. 
Hawaiian  Evangelical  Association, 

443,  444. 
Hawes,  Joel,  83,  100,  104. 
Haystack,  Williamstown,  7,  8,  491. 
Hazel  wood,  189. 
Hermosillo,  470,  473. 
Herrick,    Rev.    and    Mrs.    H.    P., 

280. 
Herrick,  James,  176. 
Hicks,  Harry  Wade,  487. 
Hideyoshi,  263. 
Hill,  Henry,  307. 
Hilo,  62,  70,  73,  78,  79. 
Hindustani  Scriptures,  21. 
Hiram     Bingham     /,     448;  Hiram 

Bingham  II,  453. 
Hoapiliwahine,  66. 
Hobbs,  Dr.  and  Mrs.  S.  L.,  188. 
Hokkaido,  355,  362,  363. 
Holman,  Dr.  Thomas,  65. 
Homes,  H.  A.,  96. 
Honan,  370. 

Hong  Kong,  113,  349,  373,  382. 
Hopkins,  Col.  C.  A.,  373. 
Hopkins,  Mark,  306.  331,  490. 
Hopkins,  Samuel,  124. 


INDEX 


513 


Horoshima,  363. 

Hou,  Pastor,  369. 

House,  J.  H.,  400,  402,  403. 

Howard,  Gen.  O.  O.,  193. 

Howe,  Miss  A.  L.,  355. 

Howland,  Mr.  and  Mrs.  John,  468, 

470,  472. 
Hsien  Yu,  374,  377. 
Hula,  228. 
Hume,  R.  A.,  417. 
Hume,  Mrs.  R.  W.,  33. 
Hungary,  466,  467. 
Hunt,  Phineas,  31,  256,  260. 
Huntington,  Gen.  Jedediah,  6. 
Husinetz,  465. 
Huss,  John,  465. 
Hyde,  C.  M.,  244,  249. 


Ichikawa,  267. 

Impanyezi,  135,  136. 

Impolweni,  435. 

Inanda,  136,  286,  427. 

India,  17,  20,  23,  25,  26,  32,  33,  482. 

India  and  Ceylon,  starting  in,  17; 
a  cold  reception,  17;  rebuffed  at 
Bombay,  18;  heavier  burdens, 
19;  the  obstacle  of  caste,  21;  the 
press  and  the  school,  21;  begin- 
ning in  Ceylon  (1816),  22; 
opening  schools,  23;  advance  in 
Bombay,  24;  advance  on  the 
mainland,  25;  heavy  losses,  26; 
educational  work  in  Ceylon,  26;  a 
boarding-school  day  in  Jaffna,  27; 
higher  education  (1826),  27;  a 
succession  of  revivals,  28;  Ma- 
dura (1834),  30;  Madras  (1836), 
31;  hard  times,  32 ;  looking  back- 
ward, 33.  (See  also  British 
India  and  Ceylon  and  Southern 
Asia.) 

Indian  National  Congress,  422. 

Indian  Rights  Association,  193. 

Indian  trails,  following,  35;  early 
efforts,  35;  purpose  of  the  Board, 


35;  Cherokee  Mission  opened 
(1817),  36;  quick  results,  37;  re- 
enforcements  and  outreaching, 
38;  mission  to  the  Choctaws 
(1818),  38;  the  Arkansas  Mis- 
sion (1821),  39;  developing  the 
establishment,  40;  some  readjust- 
ments (1825),  40;  new  missions, 
(1826-27),  41;  storm  breaks, 
(1828),  42;  persecution  of  mis- 
sionaries, 44;  the  forced  removal, 
45;  a  new  start,  46;  disappoint- 
ing experiences,  47;  hard  condi- 
tions, 48;  Oregon  Indians  (1836), 
49;  Oregon  massacre,  51;  anti- 
slavery  questions,  52;  resum^ 
(1850),  54.  (See  also  Dakotas,  in 
the  land  of.) 

Inhambane  Bay,  342. 

Innsbruck,  298. 

Instituto  Corona,  471. 

International  College,  Smyrna,  403. 

International  Institute  for  Girls  in 
Spain,  459,  462. 

Inuvil,  422. 

Ireland,  Rev.  and  Mrs.  William, 
138. 

Ishii  Juji,  356,  364. 

Islands  of  the  Pacific,  440;  islands 
as  colonial  possessions,  440; 
quiet  years  preceding,  440;  na- 
tive leadership,  441;  the  other 
side,  442;  in  new  locations  and  in 
old,  443;  the  Hawaiian  Islands 
again,  444;  Spanish  oppression, 
(1887-90),  445;  in  the  Truk 
lagoon,  447;  the  slough  of  des- 
pond, 448;  the  Spanish- Ameri- 
can War,  (1898),  450;  Guam 
opened  and  closed,  451;  Nauru, 
and  Ocean  Island,  452;  obstacles 
and  opportunities,  452;  the  mis- 
sion to  the  Philippines,  454. 
(See  also  Micronesia.) 

Isle  of  France  (Mauritius),  17. 

Italian  Free  Church,  292. 

Ivory  Coast,  127. 


514 


INDEX 


Jaffna,  22,  27. 

Jaffna  College,  179,  319,  327,  414, 
424. 

James,  D.  Willis,  483. 

Janes,  Capt.,  274. 

Japan,  263,  264,  352;  in  the  empire 
of,  263;  the  gift  of  faith,  263;  the 
door  closed,  263;  the  door  opened, 
264;  opening  the  mission  (1869), 
265;  beginning  work,  265;  the  year 
1873,  267;  medical  work  under 
way,  268;  schools  opened,  269; 
the  beginning  of  churches,  271; 
Neesima  and  the  Doshisha,  271; 
gaining  ground,  274;  broadening 
the  work,  276.  (See  also  Farther 
East,  the,  and  New  Fields.) 

Japan  Mail,  368. 

Japan,  northern,  350. 

Japanese  Pubhshing  Society,   355. 

Java,  114. 

Jerusalem,  82. 

Jessup,  WiUiam,  306. 

Jesuits,  craft  of,  297. 

Jews,  Spanish,  90. 

Johannesburg,  428. 

Johnson,  J.  G.,  360. 

Johnson,  Stephen,  120. 

Joint  missionary  campaign,  492. 

Jones,  Capt.,  66. 

Jones,  J.  P.,  329,  415. 

Jones,  Miss  Nancy,  342,  343. 

Joseph  and  His  Brethren,  129. 

Joshu,  357. 

Journal  and  Day  spring,  317. 

Journal  of  Missions,  149. 

Joyful  News,  422. 

Judson,  Adoniram,  4,  7,  10,  11,  12, 
17,  19,  76,  143,  144. 

Judson,  Miss  Cornelia,  355. 

Jugenbund,  453. 

Juji  Ishu,  356,  364. 

K 

Kaahumanu,  59,  63,  68,  69,  73. 
Kalanimoku,  59,  73. 


Kalgan,  259,  375,  377,  379. 

Kalopathakes,  Mr.,  202. 

Kama,  280. 

Kamehameha,  57,  58,  68. 

Kamundongo,  338. 

Kanjundu,  Chief,  438. 

Kapiolani,  73,  74. 

Kaumualii,  62. 

Kekela,  231. 

Kennedy,  Rev.  and  Mrs.  P.  B.,  409. 

Keopuolani,  59,  62,  73. 

Kerney,  Commodore,  121. 

Keskar,  Dr.  P.  B.,  416. 

Kimberley,  428. 

King  Glass,  128. 

King,   Rev.  Jonas,  82,  87,  88,  91, 

101,  201,  202. 
Kingman,  Abner,  307. 
Kingsbury,  Cyrus,  36,  53. 
Kirttan,  175. 

Knapp,  G.  P.,  387,  398. 
Kobe,  265,  268,  270,  271,  355. 
Kobe  College  for  Girls,  363. 
Kortcha,  403,  409. 
Krabschitz  Institute  for  Girls,  465. 
Kumi-ai,  271,  353,  359,  361,  362, 

365,  366,  367. 
Kurds  (Kuzzlebash),  223. 
Kusaie,  440. 
Kwangtung,  348. 
Kwikwi,  338,  339,  340. 
Kyoto,  265,  266,  273,  353,  354,  356, 
Kyoto  Training  School,  273,  352. 
Kyrias,  Mr.  Serastie,  410. 
Kyrias,  Miss,  403,  409. 


Labaca,  470. 
Lac-qui-parle,  189. 
Ladd,  Daniel,  88. 
Lahaina,  62,  65,  66. 
Lamson,  CM.,  490. 
Lancaster,  Joseph,  36. 
Laurie,  Thomas,  97,  486. 
Layard,  A.  H.,  197. 
Laymen's    Missionary    Movement, 
492. 


INDEX 


515 


Learned,  D.  W.,  362. 

Leavitt,  H.  H.,  276. 

Leitch,  the  Misses,  422. 

Leper  asylum,  416. 

Liebenzeller  Mission,  453. 

Life  and  Light,  485. 

Liholiho,  58,  62,  63,  68. 

Lincoln,  President,  23  L 

Lindley,  Daniel,  134,  136. 

Lintsing,  370,  374,  377,  379,  382. 

Litchfield,  Conn.,  8. 

Loba,  J.  F.,  420. 

Lobdell,  Dr.  Henry,  210. 

Lobu  Pining,  117. 

Lodz,  466. 

Logan,  R.  W.,  248,  441,  447,  448. 

London  Missionary  Society,  10,  384, 

425. 
Los  von  Rom,  466. 
Lovedale,  427. 
Lovell,  Miss  H.  M.,  222. 
Lyman,  Joseph,  6;  Henry,  116,  117. 


M 


Macedonia,  214,  389. 
Mackinaws,  47. 
MacLachlan,  Alexander,  408. 
Maclay,  Dr.,  260. 
Madison,  President,  36. 
Madrid,  460. 

Madras,  31,  180,  418,  482. 
Madura,  30,  31,  169,  176,  184,  321, 

329,  413,  414,  415,  424. 
Madura  EvangeUcal  Society,  416. 
Mahars,  30. 
Malta,  85. 
Mandans,  192. 
Mangs,  30,  417. 
Manissa,  223. 
Marash,  217,   387,  393,   395,   396, 

397. 
Marathi    Mission,    174,    182,    184, 

321,  413,  415,  417,  419,  420,  422. 
Marden,  Henry,  225. 
Mardin,  96,  217,  394,  405,  406. 
Mar  EHas,  207. 


Maronite  patriarch,  curse   of,    98, 

99. 
Maronites,  101,  204. 
Marquesas  Islands,  68,  230,  231. 
Marsh,  D.  W.,  209. 
Marsh,  Minister  G.  P.,  201. 
Marshall  Islands,  240. 
Marsovan,  198,  217,  391,  393,396. 
Martin,  W.  A.  P.,  254. 
Martyn,  Henry,  89. 
Mar  Yohannan,  94,  97. 
Massachusetts,  General  Association 

of,  3. 
Massachusetts  Missionary  Magazine, 

148. 
Matsuyama,  355. 
Matteos,  patriarch,  104. 
Maturity,    approaching,    305;     en- 
largement of  the  organization,  305; 
the  civil  war,  307;  valued  allies, 
308;    withdrawal   of   cooperating 
churches,    309;  woman's   boards, 
311;  financial  gains,   312;  finan- 
cial decline,  314;  light  in  a  dark 
sky,  315;   broadening   the   home 
base,    315;    pohcy   abroad,    318; 
the  missionaries,  321. 
Maui,  70. 
Maumees,  47. 
Mauritius,  17. 
McLeod  Hospital,  422. 
Means,  J.  O.,  194,  336,  346. 
Meigs,  B.  C,  22,  23. 
Melsetter,  436. 
Meng,  Pastor,  369,  377. 
Mennonite  Church,  396. 
Meriam,  W.  W.,  212. 
Methodist  Foreign  Missionary  Soci- 
ety, 150. 
Methodist  Mission,  376. 
Methodist    Woman's    Board,    384. 
Mexico,  350,  468. 
Micronesia,  227,  231,  235,  321,  440; 
efforts   to  withdraw,   228;  with- 
drawal at  last  (1863),  229;  mis- 
sion  of  the  Marquesas   Islands, 
230;  Micronesian  Mission  (1852), 


516 


INDEX 


232;  first  missionaries  arrive,  232; 
getting  to  work,  233;  special  hin- 
drances, 234;  progress  notwith- 
standing, 235;  the  Morning  Star, 
236;  plans  for  enlargement,  237; 
breaking  ground,  237;  the  seed 
taking  root,  239;  in  the  Carolines, 
239;  enduring  heavy  trials,  240; 
still  advance,  241 ;  other  Morning 
Stars,  242;  progress  in  the  '70s, 
243;  coming  of  age,  244;  native 
leaders,  245;  shadows,  too,  246; 
pushing  to  westward,  246;  the 
Logans  on  the  Mortlocks,  248; 
readjustments  by  experience,  248. 
(See  also  Islands  of  the  Pacific.) 

Middletown,  Conn.,  149. 

Mildmay  Park,  309. 

Miller,  S.  T.,  337,  338. 

Mills,  S.  J.,  5,  7,  8,  12,  36,  56,  124, 
290. 

Milwaukee,  315. 

Min  River,  111,  260. 

Minneapolis,  193,  492. 

Mission  Day  spring,  486. 

Mission  Reserves,  283,  430. 

Mission  Studies,  485. 

Missionary  Herald,  148,  149,  316, 
317,  485,  488. 

Missionary  Society  of  London,  10. 

Miyagawa,  T.,  277,  367. 

Miyazaki,  362. 

Mokil,  243,  244. 

Monastir,  390,  400,  402,  409. 

Monroe,  President,  37. 

Monterey,  302,  303. 

Moore,  Prof.  E.  C,  383. 

Moravia,  465. 

Morrill,  Miss  M.  S.,  372,  377. 

Morrison  centennial,  382. 

Morrison,  Robert,  108. 

Morning  Star,  bi-monthly,  171. 

Morning  Star,  missionary  ship,  236, 
237,  242,  313;  II,  242;  ///,  243, 
441;  7F,  441;  7,441. 

Morse,  Rev.  and  Mrs.  C.  F.,  212. 

Moses,  247,  441. 


Moslekatse  (Umzilikazi),  134. 

Mosul,  97. 

Mount  Sihnda,  329,  343,  344,  435, 

436. 
Mpongwes,  128,  279. 
Muller,  George,  356. 
Munson,  Samuel,  116,  117. 

N 

Nanepei,  Henry,  450. 

Naniwa,  276. 

Nanking,  113. 

Nantai,  257. 

Natal,  136,  138. 

National  Bible  Society  of  Scotland, 
467. 

National  Council's  apportionment 
plan,  493. 

National  Home  Missionary  Society, 
482. 

Native  EvangeUcal  Society,  419. 

Nearer  East,  the,  385;  attempt  at 
withdrawal,  385;  fresh  obstacles, 
387;  growth  notwithstanding, 
388;  advance  in  European  Tur- 
key, 389;  lowering  clouds,  391; 
a  carnival  of  blood  and  fire,  392; 
the  recovery,  395;  a  new  depart- 
ment, 397;  indemnity  at  last, 
398;  revival  and  encouragement, 
398;  a  time  of  advance,  399;  the 
Balkans  again  aflame,  400;  cap- 
ture of  Miss  Stone,  401;  a 
stormy  field,  402;  the  educational 
advance,  404;  a  broadening  con- 
stituency, 405 ;  contributory 
forces,  406;  political  rights  gained, 
406;  the  swift  and  silent  revolu- 
tion, 407;  the  mission's  part, 
408;  entering  Albania,  408;  a  new 
challenge,  409;  the  counter-revo- 
lution, 410;  signs  of  better  days, 
412.  (See  also  Bible  Lands,  re- 
entering, and  Turkey  and  the 
Levant. ) 

Neesima,  J.  H.,  271,  272,  273,  274, 
276,  356,  359,  360. 


INDEX 


517 


Nelson,  Rev.  and  Mrs.  C.  A.,  349. 

Nepean,  Sir  Evan,  18. 

Nestorian  Mission,  93,  94,  205,  208. 

Newell,  Rev.  and  Mrs.  Samuel,  3, 
5,  7,  12,  13,  17,  18,  19,  22. 

New  Era,  475.  Abroad  —  The  de- 
veloped missions,  475;  self-sup- 
port, 476;  native  leadership,  476; 
the  missionaries'  new  field,  477; 
the  spectacle  of  Christian  centers, 
478;  a  wider  influence,  481;  the 
union  of  missions,  482.  At  home 
—  Shoaling  waters,  483;  new 
methods  and  machinery,  484;  a 
solidifying  business,  486;  finan- 
cial strain,  487;  Mr.  Rockefel- 
ler's gift,  488;  change  of  person- 
nel, 490;  the  missionary  awaken- 
ing, 491;  new  potencies,  492; 
the  outlook,  493. 

New  Fields  — West  Africa,  336; 
spying  out  the  land,  336;  loca- 
tion at  Bihe,  336;  first  mission- 
aries, 337;  getting  on  the  field, 
337;  facing  the  task,  338;  expul- 
sion of  the  missionaries,  339;  the 
mission  planted,  340.  East  Cen- 
tral Africa  —  A  renewed  purpose, 
341;  exploring  tours,  341;  tem- 
porary location  at  Inhambane, 
342;  Rhodesia  at  last,  343;  the 
journey  in,  343;  beginnings  of 
work,  344.  Shansi  —  Beginning 
the  work,  346;  an  early  disciple, 
348.  South  China  —  Where  home 
and  foreign  met,  348;  the  mission's 
method,  349.  Northern  Japan  — 
an  artificial  division,  350.  North- 
ern Mexico  —  Another  temporary 
distinction,  350. 

"New  School"  Presbyterians,  151. 

New  Testament  (Arabic),  203. 

New  West  Commission,  471. 

New  York,  148,  482. 

Nez  Perces,  46. 

Nicomedia,  86,  102,  106,  393. 

Niigata,  350,  360. 


Ningpo,  113. 

Noodsberg,  434. 

Norris,  Dr.  Sarah  F.,  422. 

Norris,  Mrs.  Mary,  13. 

North  Arcot  Mission,  172. 

North  China,  256,  261. 

North  China  College,  370,  371,  372. 

North  China  Union  Arts  College, 
384. 

North  China  Union  Medical  Col- 
lege, 384. 

North  China  Union  Theological 
College,  384. 

North  Pacific  Institute,  249,  444, 
445. 

Northampton,  140. 

Northern  Mexican  Mission,  468, 
471. 

Norton,  Ruth,  Girls'    School,  382. 

Nott,  Samuel,  Jr.,  5,  7,  12,  19. 


Oberlin,  322,  381,  492. 
"Oberlin  Band,"  345. 
Obookiah,  Henry,  56. 
Ochileso,  439. 
Ojibwas,  46,  186. 
Okayama,  277,  356,  364. 
Okuma,  Count,  361. 
"Old   School"   Presbyterians,    151. 
Omoto,  Mr.,  355. 
Oniop,  245,  248. 

Oodooville,  girls'  school,  28,  421. 
Oorfa,  393,  395,  396,  397,  405. 
Opataia,  244. 
Opatinia,  Princess,  244. 
Opium,  258,  347. 
Ordinations,  first,  13. 
Oregon  Indians,  49,  51. 
Osage  Mission,  42,  47. 
Osaka,  265,  271,  276,  352,  363,  364. 
Osmaniyeh,  411. 
Otis,  Asa,  315,  325. 
Otsu,  276. 

Ottley,  Sir  Richard,  27. 
Ousley,  Rev.  and  Mrs.  Benjamin, 
342. 


518 


INDEX 


Page,  ex-Governor  of  Verraont,  315. 

Palestine  Mission,  87. 

Palmer,  H.  K.,  414. 

Palmer,  Miss  A.  A.,  446. 

Panoplist,  148. 

Pang-Chuang,  369,  370,  371,  372, 
374,  379. 

Pangwes,  129,  131,  279. 

Pao-ting-fu,  369,  372,  375,  377, 
379. 

Papal  lands,  456;  creating  a  new 
atmosphere,       456.  Spain  — 

Against  many  adversities,  450; 
educational  development,  458; 
in  war  times,  459;  growth  of 
religious  freedom,  461 ;  two  schools 
instead  of  one,  462;  in  one  genera- 
tion, 462.  Austria  —  With  freer 
hand,  463;  spreading  the  gospel, 
464;  some  allies  and  alleviations, 
464;  some  enlargements,  465;  on 
the  wings  of  the  wind,  466.  Mex- 
ico —  Reorganization  and  ad- 
vance, 468;  hues  of  work,  469; 
educational  development,  470; 
consolidation  and  concentration, 
471;  an  outreaching  mission, 
472;  the  outlook,  474.  (See  also 
Christian  lands,  in  nominally.) 

Papala,  432. 

Park  Street  Church,  Boston,  9,  56, 
236,  311. 

Parker,  Samuel,  49;  Dr.  Peter,  109, 
110,  112,  113,  121. 

Parral,  470,  471. 

Parsons,  J.  W.,  225. 

Parsons,  Levi,  80,  81,  82. 

Parsons,  Justin,  198. 

Parvin,  Theophilus,  290. 

Pastors'  series,  485. 

Pasumalai,  33,  34,  414,  415,  419, 
424. 

Patagonia,  155. 

Pau,  457. 

Pawnees,  46. 


Peabody,  A.  P.,  230. 
Pease,  Dr.  E.  M.,  441,  448. 
Peet,  L.  D.,  120,  250;  W.  W.,  402. 
Peking,  253,  256,  348,  370,  371,  372, 

375,  376,  379,  383. 
Pera,  103,  106,  200,  216,  222. 
Perkins,  Rev.  and  Mrs.  Justin,  94, 

97,  208. 
Perry,  Commodore,  264. 
Persian  Mission,  208,  209.     *" 
Peshtimaljian,  91. 
Petit,  Sir  D.  M.,  418. 
Pettee,  Rev.  and  Mrs.  J.  H.,  277, 

356. 
Phelps,  A.  G.,  314. 
Philadelphia,  147. 
PhiUpopolis,  390,  403. 
Pierson,  Dr.  and  Mrs.  George,  233. 
Pietermaritzburg,  426. 
Pilsen,  465. 
Pingelap,  243,  244. 
Pinkerton,  M.  W.,  287,  341. 
Pitkin,  H.  T.,  7,  377. 
Pixley,  S.  C,  426. 
Plum  Blossom  School,  276. 
Pohlman,  W.  J.,  120. 
Pomeroy,  Dr.  and  Mrs.  H.  S.,  463. 
Ponape,  233,  234. 
Pond,  G.  H.  and  S.  W.,  48,  192. 
Poor,  Daniel,  22,  23. 
Pope,  the,  as  arbitrator,  445. 
Porter,  Noah,  140;  Dr.  H.  D.,  261; 

E.  G.,  309;  Miss  M.  H.,  372;  J. 
S.,  465. 

Powers,  P.  O.,  198. 

Prague,    297,    464,    465,    466,    467, 

468. 
Presbyterians,  150. 
Prescott,  Miss  E.  O.,  471. 
Pretoria,  428. 
Price,  Rev.  and  Mrs.  C.  W.,  347; 

F.  M.,  451. 

Proctor,  Miss  M.  A.,  222. 
Providence,  R.  I.,  314,  318. 
Prudential  Committee,  10,  140,  141. 
Puaaiki,  75. 
Puna,  62. 


INDEX 


519 


Q 


s 


Quarterly  Bulletin,  485. 
Queen  Regent  of  Spain,  461. 

R 

Rahuri,  422. 

Rand,  Rev.  and  Mrs.  F.  E.,  442, 
446,  447,  449. 

Rankin,  Miss,  300. 

Ransom,  C.  W.,  433. 

Ray,  Lord,  414. 

Raynolds,  G.  C,  387. 

Read,  U.  S.  Minister,  254. 

Red  Cross,  362,  393. 

"Reformed  Catholic  Mission,"  230. 

Reformed  Church  in  America, 
306. 

Renville,  Joseph,  48. 

Rescue  Reform  Home,  465. 

Rhodes,  Hon.  Cecil,  343. 

Rhodesia,  343,  435. 

Rice,  Luther,  13,  19. 

Richards,  James,  12,  22 ;  William, 
66,  67;  W.  L.,  250;  E.  H.,  342. 

Richards,  Miss  S.  F.,  457. 

Rife,  Dr.  and  Mrs.  C.  F.,  453. 

Riggs,  Elias,  87,  88,  213,  401;  S.  R., 
190, 

Robert,  C.  R.,  217. 

Robert  College,  221,  390. 

Robert  W.  Logan,  449. 

Rockefeller,  J.  D.,  488. 

Rogers,  D.  M.,  410. 

Roman  Catholic  Church,  intoler- 
ance of,  152. 

Rood,  David,  284. 

"Rooms,"  American  Board,  486. 

Ropes,  J.  S.,  307. 

Ropes,  Wilham,  263. 

Roumelia,  eastern,  389. 

Ruggles,  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Samuel,  59, 
68. 

Russell,  Miss  N.  N.,  371. 

Ruth  Norton  Girls'  School,  382. 

Ruth  Tracy  Strong  Mission,   436. 

Rutland,  Vermont,  318. 


Sabi  Valley,  437. 

Sachikela,  439. 

Salem  Tabernacle  Church,  14. 

Salonica,  198,  199,  390,  400,  402, 
403,  405. 

Samokov,  386,  400,  403. 

Samokov  Institute,  390. 

Sanda,  270. 

Sanders,  Rev.  and  Mrs.  W.  H.,  337, 
340. 

Sandwich  Islands,  228,  229;  trans- 
forming the,  56;  the  incentive,  56; 
first  missionaries,  56;  surprising 
reception,  57;  not  a  religious  refor- 
mation, 57;  stupendous  task,  58; 
moral  degradation,  59;  welcome 
and  location,  59;  the  press  and  the 
school,  60;  hard  conditions,  61; 
helpful  arrivals,  62;  better  rulers, 
63;  spread  of  the  work,  63; 
mighty  against  odds,  64;  per- 
secution by  foreigners,  65;  prog- 
ress, 66;  covering  the  islands,  66; 
first  awakening  (1828),  67;  de- 
cHne  in  rehgion  and  morals,  68; 
renewed  effort,  69;  new  code  of 
laws  (1839),  70;  advance  at  Hilo, 
71;  the  great  awakening  (1838- 
39),  71;  eminent  converts,  73; 
"Bhnd  Bartimeus,"  75;  poUtical 
disturbances  (1842),  75;  spiral 
progress  (1840-50),  76;  a  self- 
reliant  church,  78.  (See  also 
Micronesia  and  Islands  of  the 
Pacific. ) 

San  Sebastian,  456,  458. 

Santander,  293,  294,  456. 

Santee  Agency,  192,  193. 

Sapporo,  362. 

Sassoun,  392. 

Sati,  25,  165. 

Sawayama,  Paul,  267,  276. 

Schauffler,  William,  90;  H.  A.,  297, 
298,  463. 

Schneider,  Benjamin,  88,  93, 197,  223 


520 


INDEX 


School  of  Industrial  Arts,  418. 

Schubert,  Pastor,  298. 

Scudder,  Dr.  and  Mrs.  John,  31,  32; 

Dr.  H.  M.,  172;  W.  W.,  172. 
Scutari,  199. 
Seattle,  492. 

Sendai,  350,  354,  360,  364. 
Seneca  Mission,  186. 
Sepoy  Mutiny,  173. 
Seville,  292. 

Seymour,  Miss  Hattie,  386. 
Shaftesbury,  Earl  of,  107,  308. 
Shanghai,  113,  251,  383,  482. 
Shangtung,  111,  370,  374. 
Shansi,  345,  347,  369,  370,  373,  377, 

380,  381. 
Shansi  Memorial  Association,  381. 
Shao-wu,  260,  369,  373. 
Shattuck,  Miss  Corinna,  394,  395. 
Shedd,  J.  H.,  207. 
Sheffield,  D.  Z.,  260,  261,  370. 
Shikoku,  274. 
Shinto,  353,  354. 
Sholapur,  175,  416,  418. 
Siam  Mission,  116. 
Sibley,  Dr.  and  Mrs.  C.  T.,  454. 
Sidon,  203. 
Sinas,  Pastor,  403. 
Singapore,  111. 
Sioux,  19,  46,  48. 
Sirur,  329,  414. 
Sissitons,  190. 
Sivas,  392,  394,  396. 
Slavery,  186. 
Slavs,  463. 

Smallpox,  115,  228,  234. 
Smith,    A.    H.   261,   370;   Azariah, 

197;  Eli,  85,  88,  89,  91,  93,  99; 

James,  418;  Judson,  345,  346,  373. 
Smyrna,  87,  88,  222,  389,  393,  405. 
Snow,  Rev.  and  Mrs.  B.  G.,  232. 
Society  of  Friends,  397. 
"Society  of  Reformed  Catholics," 

302. 
Sofia,  390,  403,  408. 
Sonora,  473. 
South  America,  155. 


South  China,  373,  348,  382. 

Southern  Asia,  413;  a  jubilee  indeed, 
413;  era  of  educational  growth, 
414;  religious  development  of  the 
fields,  415;  famine  and  plague 
again,  416;  enlarging  industrial 
work,  418;  Christian  cujture,  418; 
the  deputation  of  1902,  420.  (See 
also  India  and  Ceylon  and  British 
India  and  Ceylon.) 

Southern  and  Central  Africa,  426; 
a  jubilee  survey,  426;  a  slow 
transformation,  427;  fresh  plans 
and  efforts,  427;  other  signs  of 
growth,  428 ;  dangers  of  independ- 
ence, 429;  deputation's  findings, 
431;  Zulu  rebellion,  433;  progress 
in  East  Central  Africa,  435;  in- 
dustrial work,  435;  the  outlook, 
436;  in  West  Africa,  437;  Ufe  at 
the  stations,  437;  difficulties  with 
the  Portuguese,  438.  (See  also 
Africa,  attempting,  New  Fields  and 
Dark  Continent,  in  the.) 

Southern  Board  of  Foreign  Mis- 
sions, 151. 

Southern  Methodists,  468. 

Sophocles,  Professor,  87. 

Spain,  456;  Queen  Regent  of,  461. 

Spanish  Evangehcal  Union,  458. 

Spanish  Jew^s,  90. 

Spalding,  Rev.  and  Mrs.  H.  H.,  49, 
52. 

Spaulding,  Levi,  23,  180. 

Spirit  Lake,  189. 

Spring,  Samuel,  3,  5,  6. 

St.  Paul,  Minn.,  190. 

St.  Paul's  Institute,  403. 

St.  Petersburg,  467. 

Stamboul,  200. 

Standard  Oil  Company,  488. 

Standing  Rock  Agency,  194. 

Stanley,  C.  C,  261;  H.  M.,  288. 

Stephan,  Patriarch,  102. 

Stephens,  J.  L.,  300,  302. 

Stevens,  Edwin,  111. 

Stewart,  James,  427. 


INDEX 


521 


Stiles,  Ezra,  124. 

Stimson,  Rev.  and  Mrs.  M.  L.,  345, 

348. 
Stockbridge  Indians,  47. 
Stoddard,  D.  T.,  97;  Charles,  307, 

332. 
Stone,  Miss  E.  M.,  401,  402. 
Storrs,  R.  S.,  331,  490. 
Stover,  W.  M.,  439. 
Strong,  E.  E.,  431. 
Strong,  Miss  C.  M.,  303. 
Strong,  Ruth  Tracy,  Mission,  436. 
Strong,  Rev.  and  Mrs.  Sydney,  431. 
Strumnitza,  402. 
Stuart,  Prof.  Moses,  3. 
Student  Volunteer  Movement,  492. 
Sturges,  Rev.  and  Mrs.  A.  A.,  232, 

441. 
Swett,  S.  W.,  325. 
Syrian  Protestant  College,  205. 


Tabernacle  Church,  Salem,  14. 

Tabriz,  94. 

Tabu,  55,  58. 

Tai-ku,  346,  347,  377,  381. 

T'ai  Fing  rebellion,  250. 

Tai-yuan-fu,  346. 

Talcott,  Miss  Eliza,  270. 

Tama,  Deacon,  206. 

Tamil  Scriptures,  32. 

Tanaka,  Mr.,  273. 

Tank  Home,  322. 

Tappan,  John,  307. 

Tarragona,  457. 

Tarsus,  410,  411. 

Taylor,  Dr.  Wallace,  268;  J.  D.,  433. 

TeUippallai,  422. 

Temple,  Daniel,  85,  88. 

Ten  Years  on  the  Euphrates,  320. 

Thaddeus,  56. 

The  Broad  and  Narrow  Way,  129. 

The  Christian,  294. 

The  Land  and  the  Book,  203. 

The  Middle  Kingdom,  121. 

The  Weekly  Messenger,  276. 


Thompson,   A.   C,   166,    194,   307, 
332;  J.  P.,  299;  Dr.  W.  L.,  343. 

Thomson,  W.    M.,    99;    Rev.    and 
Mrs.  Robert,  400. 

Thurston,  Asa,  57. 

Tibet,  156. 

Tientsin,   256,  259,   371,  375,  377, 
379,  380. 

TilUpalli  School,  422. 

Tirana,  409. 

Tissira,  Gabriel,  29. 

Tocat,  200. 

Tokyo,  265,  278,  352,  363,  364. 

Torrey,  Elbridge,  332. 

Treadwell,  Governor  John,  6. 

Treat,  Secretary  S.  B.,  37,  307. 

Trebizond,  93,  104,  392,  395. 

Trowbridge,  T.  C,  220. 

True  News,  415,  422. 

Truk,  246,  247,  441. 

TsUka,  Mr.  and  Mrs.,  401,  402,  409, 
410. 

Tung-Chou,  260,  370,  371,  372,  373, 
375,  379,  384. 

Turkey  and  the  Levant,  196; 
changed  situation,  196;  laborers 
for  the  harvest,  198;  enlarging 
field,  200;  Jonas  King  in  Greece, 
201;  in  stormy  Syria,  202;  gain, 
203;  Syria's  civil  war  (1860),  204; 
recovery,  204;  Nestorian  Mis- 
sion, 205;  native  preachers,  206; 
wider  impression,  207;  growing 
church  life,  207;  Assyrian  Mis- 1 
sion,  209;  pioneers,  210;  enter- 
ing European  Turkey,  211;  slow 
work,  212 ;  mission  organized 
(1871),  213;  new  era  for  Arme- 
nians (1860),  215;  pivotal  period, 
216;  growing  stations,  217;  native 
agency,  218;  advance  in  organ- 
ization and  establishment,  220; 
work  for  women,  221;  sur- 
mounting obstacles,  223;  era  of 
higher  education,  224;  Russo- 
Turkish  war,  225;  an  eventful 
period,  226.    (See  also  Bible  lands, 


522 


INDEX 


reentering,      and      Nearer     East, 

the.) 
Turkish  Missions  Aid  Society,  308 
Turner,  Bishop,  152. 
Tuscarora,  186.  . 
Twentieth  Century  Fund,  487. 
Tyler,  Josiah,  138,  285,  289. 


U 


Uduvil  Girls'  School,  421. 

Umbiyana,  285. 

Umlazi,  135. 

Umpandi,  135,  136. 

Umvote,  136. 

Umzila,  341. 

Umzihkazi  (Moselekatse),  134, 

Umzumbe,  286,  427. 

Union  Theological  College,  424. 

Union  Woman's  College,  384. 

Unitarianism,  8. 

United  Church  of  South  India,  424. 

United  Free  Church   of    Scotland, 

425. 
University  of  Calcutta,  414. 
University  of  Madras,  424. 
Urumia,  94,  97. 
Utica,  168. 


Vadala,  414. 

Valley  of  the  Mississippi  Society, 

150. 
Van,  223,  392,  394,  395,  400,  406. 
Van  Allen,  Dr.  Frank,  422. 
Van  Dyck,  C.  V.  A.,  99. 
Van  Lennep,  H.  J.,  88. 
Venables,  H.  I.,  134. 
Verein  Betanie,  463. 
Vienna,  466,  467. 
Vrooman,  Daniel,  257. 


W 


Wagner,  H.  T.,  473. 
Wai,  423. 


Waldensians,  292. 

Walker,  WilUam,    279;  Mrs.  Eliza, 

322. 
Walkup,  Capt.  A.  C,  440,  444,  448, 

453,  454. 
Walley,  Deacon  S.  H.,  6. 
Walter,  F.  A.,  339. 
Ward,  L.  S.,  307. 
Warren,  Edward,  12,  22. 
Washburn,  G.  T.,  415. 
Washington  Islands,  68. 
Washington,  State  of,  49. 
Watkins,  D.  F.,  300,  301,  468. 
Webster,  Daniel,  201. 
Week  of  Prayer,  150. 
Wesley ans,  425. 
West  Africa,  336,  437. 
West,  Dr.  H.  L.,  223. 
West,  Miss  M.  A.,  222. 
Western  Asia  Mission,  87. 
Western  Mexican  Mission,  468,  471. 
Western  Turkey  Mission,  217,  218. 
W^heeler,  C.  H.,  219,  320,  394. 
Wheeler,  Miss  E  C,  397. 
White,  Judge,  141. 
Whitman,     Dr.     Marcus,    49,    50, 

51. 
Whitney,  Dr.  H.  T.,  370. 
Whitney,  Rev.  and  Mrs.  J.  F.,  243. 
Whittemore,  William  F.,  420. 
Whittlesey,  Gen.,  193. 
Widows'  Aid  Society,  416. 
Wilberforce,  William,  18. 
Wilcox,  W.  C,  342. 
Wilder,  H.  A.,  138;  G.  A.,  342,  343, 

345. 
Williams,  Bishop,  265;  S.  W.,  109, 

112,  119,  121,  253,  254,  255,  368; 

T.  S.,  153;  W.  F.,  209,  210. 
Williamson,  48,  188,  192,  194. 
Williamstown,  Mass.,  7. 
Wilson,  J.  L.,  124,  126,  129,  134. 
Winnebagoes,  191. 
Winslow,   Miron,   23,   180;    F.    O., 

431. 
Winsor,  Richard,  414. 
Wishard,  L.  D.,  484. 
Woman's  Bible  Training  School,  366. 


INDEX 


523 


Woman's  Board  of  Missions,  222, 

311,  458. 
Wood,  G.  W.,  307. 
Woodhull,  Dr.  Kate  C,  370. 
Worcester,  Samuel,   3,  4,  5,  6,  161 ; 

S.  A.,  44,  45, 187. 
Worcester,  Mass.,  11. 
Wortabet,  Gregory,  84. 
Wright,  A.  C.,  471,  472. 
Wyckoff,  Miss  H.  G.,  372. 
Wyncoop,  S.  K.,  125. 


Young  Men's  Society  for  Diffusing 
Missionary  Knowledge,  155. 

Young  People  and  Education,  de- 
partment for,  487. 

Young  People's  Missionary  Move- 
ment, 492. 

Young  People's  Society  of  Christian 
Endeavor,  415,  461,  492. 

Young  Turk  party,  407. 

Young  Women's  Christian  Associa- 
tion, 465. 

YoutWs  Dayspring,  149. 

Yu  Hsien,  374,  377. 


Yamamoto,  273,  276. 
Yedo,  111,  264. 
Yellow  Medicine,  188. 
Yesuba,  173. 
Yesuba  Powar,  173. 
Yokohama,  266. 

Young    Men's    Christian    Associa- 
tion, 464,  465. 
Young  Men's  Home,  416. 


Zaragoza,  293,  294,  295,  457. 
Zeitoon,  225,  393. 
Zippora,  441. 
Zornitza,  390,  400,  408. 
Zulu  Mission,    132,   133,   134,   135, 
281,  288,  429,  434. 


ERRATA 

Page  176,  for  "  Merrick"  read  "  Herrick  " 

Page  403,  for '' Agricultural  and  Theological"  read  "Agricultural  and 
Industrial." 


Date  Due 


Vs^'^mm^. 


'  '^  V54 


